Ill 

INNOCENCE  AND  PATHOS:    THE  TRAGEDY  OF 
ROMEO  AND  JULIET 

In  the  preceding  chapter  we  have  been  reviewing  a  drama  the 
plot  of  which  presents  the  universe  as  an  elaborate  system  of  retri- 
bution. In  turning  from  this  to  other  stories  we  are  not  to  expect 
that  in  these  the  same  aspect  of  the  universe  will  be  the  one 
emphasised.  I  beHeve  that  no  mistake  has  done  more  to  distort 
Shakespeare  criticism  than  the  assumption  on  the  part  of  so  many 
commentators  that  retribution  is  an  invariable  principle.  Their 
favourite  maxims  are  that  the  deed  returns  upon  the  doer,  that  char- 
acter determines  fate.  But  these  specious  principles  need  careful 
examination.  If  the  meaning  be  merely  this,  that  the  deed  often 
returns  upon  the  doer,  that  character  is  one  of  the  forces  deter- 
mining fate,  then  these  are  profound  truths.  But  if,  as  is  usually 
the  case,  there  is  the  suggestion  that  such  maxims  embody  inva- 
riable laws  —  that  the  deed  always  returns  upon  the  doer,  that  char- 
acter and  nothing  but  character  determines  the  fate  of  mdividuals 
—  then  the  principles  are  false  j  false  alike  to  Hfe  itself  and'  to  the 
reflection  of  life  in  poetry. 

To  take  a  crucial  illustration.  The  Cordelia  of  Shakespeare  is 
recognised  by  all  as  a  sweet  and  loving  woman  who  devotes  her- 
self to  save  her  father.  In  the  sequel  she  is  defeated,  imprisoned, 
and  cruelly  hanged.  Commentators  who  have  assumed  the  inva- 
riability of  nemesis  feel  bound  to  find  in  Cordelia's  character  some 
flaw  which  will  justify  such  an  ending  to  her  career.  They  suggest 
that,  however  noble  her  aim,  in  the  means  employed  she  has 
sinned  against  patriotism,  by  calling  in  the  French — natural  ene- 
mies of  England,  we  are  to  understand  —  to  rescue  Lear  from  his 

46 


INNOCENCE  AND  PATHOS  47 

evil  daughters  :  this  sin  against  patriotism  must  be  atoned  for  by 
suffering  and  ignominy.  I  am  persuaded  that  no  one  who  comes 
to  the  play  without  a  theory  to  support  will  so  read  the  course  of 
the  story.  There  is  not  a  single  detail  of  Shakespeare's  poem  to 
which  such  a  violation  of  patriotism  can  be  attached ;  those  in  the 
story  who  are  most  patriotic  are  on  Cordelia's  side,  and  even  Albany, 
whose  office  obliges  him  to  resist  the  French  invasion,  complains 
that  he  cannot  be  valiant  where  his  conscience  is  on  the  other 
side.^  Cordelia  no  more  sins  against  patriotism,  in  using  the 
French  army  to  resist  the  wicked  queens,  than  the  authors  of  the 
revolution  of  1688  were  unpatriotic,  when  they  called  in  William 
of  Orange  to  deliver  England  from  King  James.  How  then  is  the 
untoward  fate  of  Cordelia  to  be  explained?  The  plot  of  the  playT 
at  this  point  is  dominated,  not  by  nemesis,  but  by  another  dramatic  / 
motive ;  it  is  not  satisfying  our  sense  of  retribution,  but  exhibiting  ' 
the  pathos  that  unlocks  the  sympathy  of  the  spectator,  and  sheds 
a  beauty  over  suffering  itself.  Cordelia  has  devoted  herself  to  her 
father :  fate  mysteriously  seconds  her  devotion,  and  leaves  out 
nothing,  not  even  her  life,  to  make  the  sacrifice  complete. 

It  is  obvious  that  to  approach  dramas  with  some  antecedent 
assumption  as  to  principles  invariably  to  be  found  in  them  is  a  vio- 
lation of  the  inductive  criticism  attempted  in  this  work,  which 
frankly  accepts  the  details  of  a  poem  as  they  stand  in  order  to 
evolve  from  these  alone  the  underlying  principles.  But  1  would 
for  the  moment  waive  this  point  in  order  to  ask,  What  authority 
have  we  for  the  assumption  itself  that  retribution  is  an  invariable 
principle  of  providential  government?  In  the  drama  of  antiquity, 
as  all  will  concede,  no  such  principle  holds ;  Greek  tragedy  is  • 
never  so  tragic  as  where  it  exhibits  the  good  man  crushed  by 
external  force  of  Destiny.  But  the  contention  is  often  made  that 
all  this  has  been  changed  by  modern  religion,  not  any  particular 
theological  system,  but  the  whole  spirit  of  modern  religion,  of 
which  the  Bible  is  the  embodiment ;  that  this  has  introduced  such 
conceptions  of  God  and  of  man  that  Shakespeare  and  other 
1  Lear:  V,  i.  23. 


-c^u..      •      /\ 


/?'^y 


THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF 
SHAKESPEARE 


:'^H^)<9>^- 


x9       ^   o 


The 
Moral  System  of  Shakespeare 

A  POPULAR  ILLUSTRATION  OF 

FICTION   AS   THE   EXPERIMENTAL  SIDE 
OF  PHILOSOPHY 

BY 


RICHARD  G.  MOULTON,  M.A.  (Camb.),  Ph.D.  (Penna.) 

PROFESSOR   OF  LITERATURE    (IN  ENGLISH)    IN   THE   UNIVERSITY  OF  CHICAGO 

UNIVERSITY  EXTENSION  LECTURER  IN  LITERATURE   (ENGLAND 

AND  AMERICA) 

AUTHOR  OF  "  THE  ANCIENT  CLASSICAL  DRAMA,"  ETC.,  EDITOR  OF 

"THE  MODERN  READER'S  BIBLE" 


THE    MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

LONDON :  MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  Ltd. 
1903  '^ 

All  rights  reserved 


13^ 


Copyright,   1903, 
By  the   MACMILLAN    COMPANY. 


Set  up,  electrotyped,  and  published  May,  1903. 


J.  S.  Cuibing  &  Co.  —  Berwick  ©"  Smith  Co, 
Norwood f  Mass.f  U.S.A. 


PREFACE 

The  purpose  and  scope  of  this  work  are  fully  set  forth  in  the 
introductory  section.  A  preface  is  desirable  only  for  explana- 
tions upon  two  points  of  detail. 

My  former  book,  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist^  originally 
published  (by  the  Clarendon  Press,  Oxford)  in  1885,  is  now 
(third  edition,  1893)  in  extensive  use  amongst  private  readers 
and  in  schools  and  universities.  This  present  work  illustrates 
an  entirely  different  view  point  of  literary  study.  Necessarily, 
however,  two  books  treating  the  same  author  must  have  some 
points  in  common.  Where  this  is  the  case,  I  have  usually  in 
the  present  work  given  the  briefest  treatment  consistent  with 
clearness,  the  reader  being  referred  by  footnotes  to  the  other 
book  for  fuller  discussion. 

In  what  is  intended  primarily  for  the  general  reader  I  have 
wished  to  exclude  technical  discussion  from  the  text.  Believing, 
however,  that  precise  analysis  of  structure  is  the  best  founda- 
tion for  the  fullest  appreciation  of  literary  beauty,  I  have  added 
an  Appendix,  which  gives  formal  schemes  of  plot  for  each  of 
the  Shakespearean  plays.  In  these  analyses  I  have  broken 
away  altogether  from  the  current  schemes  of  plot  analysis. 
These,  however  able  in  detail,  appear  to  me  to  be  in  method 
no  more  than  adaptations  of  Aristotle's  principles  to  new  matter ; 
they  are  thus  survivals  of  the  Renaissance  criticism,  in  which 
all  that  might  be  newly  created  must  be  surveyed  from  the  one 
standpoint  of  Greek  art.  But  Greek  Drama  and  Shakespearean 
Drama  —  of  equal  importance  in  universal  literature  —  stand 
nevertheless  at  opposite  poles  of  dramatic  structure ;  the  one 

904664 


VI  PREFACE 

rests  upon  the  severe  simplicity  of  the  unities,  the  other  reaches 
after  free  play  and  fulness,  rejoicing  to  draw  the  most  complex 
material  into  artistic  harmony.  Accordingly,  I  have  adopted  a 
method  of  dramatic  analysis  which  allows  dramatic  movement 
to  fall  into  the  second  place,  while  the  chief  prominence  is 
given  to  the  multiplication  of  stories  which  is  the  essence  of  the 
Romantic  Drama,  and  to  the  exquisite  effects  of  balance  and 
symmetry  which  make  its  artistic  glory.  We  moderns  pay  the 
best  tribute  to  the  Founder  of  Criticism  when  we  imitate,  not  his 
results,  but  his  spirit,  and  interrogate  the  new  literary  material, 
as  Aristotle  interrogated  his  Greek  Drama,  for  the  principles 
which  best  explain  the  literary  product. 

By  this  combination  of  general  discussion  in  the  text  with 
formal  analysis  in  the  Appendix  I  have  tried  to  make  what 
may  serve  as  a  text-book  of  Shakespeare  for  students  of  literary 
clubs  or  scholastic  institutions.  And  I  would  say  to  the  reader 
who  is  conscious  to  himself  of  being  no  more  than  a  pleasure 
seeker  in  his  reading,  that  he  will  consult  best  for  his  own 
pleasure  if  he  will  give  attention  to  the  foundation  interest  of 
dramatic  structure,  as  enhancing  beauties  of  effect  which  lie 
more  upon  the  surface. 

RICHARD  G.  MOULTON. 
April,  1903. 


CONTENTS 


INTRODUCTION 

PAGE 

What  is  implied  in  "The  Moral  System  of  Shakespeare"         .        i 


BOOK   I 

Root  Ideas  of  Shakespeare's  Moral  System 

CHAPTER 

I.  Heroism  and  Moral  Balance :  The  first  four  Histories         .         .  13 

II.  Wrong  and  Retribution :  The  second  four  Histories   •         .         .  33 

III.  Innocence  and  Pathos :  The  Tragedy  of  Romeo  and  Juliet         .  46 

IV.  Wrong  and  Restoration :    The  Comedies  of  Winter's  Tale  and 

Cymbeline 65 

V.    The  Life  Without  and  the  Life  Within :   The  Mask-Tragedy  of 

Henry  the  Eighth. 89 

BOOK   II 

Shakespeare's  World  in  its  Moral  Complexity 

VI.  The  Outer  and  Inner  in  Application  to  Roman  Life    .         .         .111 

VII.  Moral  Problems  Dramatised  .     -- 141 

VIII.  Comedy  as  Life  in  Equilibrium 158 

IX.  Tragedy  as  Equilibrium  Overthrown 185 

X.  The  Moral  Significance  of  Humour 195 

vii 


viii  CONTENTS 


BOOK  III 

The  Forces  of  Life  in  Shakespeare's  Moral  World 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

XI.     Personality  and  its  Dramatic  Expression  in  Intrigue  and  Irony  .     209 

XII.    The  Momentum  of  Character  and  the  Sway  of  Circumstance  .     242 

XIII.  The  Pendulum  of  History 269 

XIV.  Supernatural  Agency  in  Shakespeare's  Moral  World  .         .  .     297 
XV.     Moral  Accident  and  Overruling  Providence         .        .         .  .311 


APPENDIX 

Plot  Schemes  of  Shakespearean  Dramas 327 

Index  to  the  Plays 375 

General  Index    .        «       .       »       «       t       «       «       «       •       •  37^ 


THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF 
SHAKESPEARE 


THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 


INTRODUCTION 

WHAT  IS  IMPLIED  IN  "THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF 
SHAKESPEARE  " 

The  title  of  this  work,  The  Moral  System  of  Shakespeare,  is  not 
intended  to  suggest  that  the  man  Shakesjie'a'fe  had  formed  in  his 
mind  a  certain  system  of  morals,  which  he  proceeded  to  put  into 
his  plays.  Indeed,  this  book  does  not  concern  itself  in  any  way 
with  the  man  Shakespeare ;  if  any  of  my  readers  incUnes  to  the 
view  that  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  were  written  by  Lord  Bacon, 
or,  for  that  matter,  by  Queen  Elizabeth,  he  will  find  nothing  in  the 
pages  that  follow  to  disturb  his  faith.  *  Shakespeare '  is  only  used 
as  a  convenient  name  for  the  whole  body  of  thirty-six  dramas 
usually  attributed  to  William  Shakespeare,  by  whomsoever  these 
dramas  may  have  been  composed,  in  whatsoever  way  they  may 
have  been  put  together.  The  contents  of  these  thirty-six  plays 
make  a  world  of  their  own,  a  world  of  personages,  of  incidents,  of 
story.  It  is  surely  possible  to  survey  this  imaginary  world  from 
the  same  standpoint  from  which  the  moralist  surveys  the  world  of 
reality  :  the  result  of  such  a  survey,  put  together  with  some  degree 
of  methodical  order,  will  give  us  the  moral  system  of  the  Shake- 
spearean Drama. 

At  the  outset  of  our  task  a  word  of  disclaimer  must  be  said 
/"against  what  may  be  called  the  Fallacy  of  Quotations.  Nothing  is 
(  commoner  than  the  attempt  to  convey  the  mind  of  Shakespeare 
\  by  passages  from  his  plays.     Yet  this  is  obviously  delusive.     If  we 


2  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

were  to  select  a  large  number  of  moral  topics,  if  we  were  to  arrange 
these  in  alphabetical  order  from  Atonement  to  Zeal,  if  under  each 
heading  we  were  diligently  to  collect  extracts  from  the  thirty-six 
dramas,  pointed  sayings  and  passionate  outpourings,  we  should  at 
the  end  of  our  labour  be  no  nearer  than  we  were  at  the  beginning 
to  the  moral  system  of  Shakespeare.  For  dramatic  differs  from 
other  literature  in  this,  that  quotations  from  a  play  can  never 
reveal  either  the  mind  of  the  author  or  the  spirit  of  the  drama. 
"  Man  is  born  unto  trouble  as  the  sparks  fly  upward,  as  the  Bible 
says."  But  the  Bible  does  not  say  so.  The  words  are  found  in 
the  dramatic  Book  of  Job  as  part  of  what  is  spoken  by  Eliphaz  the 
Temanite ;  and  the  same  Book  of  Job  represents  God  as  declaring 
that  Eliphaz  has  not  said  tht  thing  that  is  right.  Is  the  Bible  to  be 
held  responsible  for  the  sentiment  of  one  whom  it  represents  God 
as  reppjdiating^?, .  Inf^niB  Qf  Shatkdspeare's  plays  is  found  this  senti- 
ment: '  •    '         •     ' 

Conscience  is  but  a  word  that  cowards  use, 
Devised  at  first  to  keep  the  strong  in  awe. 

In  another  play  appears  this  other  saying  — 

Thus  conscience  does  make  cowards  of  us  all ! 

For  which  of  these  contradictory  sentiments  is  Shakespeare  to  be 
held  responsible  ?  He  is  responsible  for  neither.  The  first  extract 
represents  nothing  but  the  opinion  of  such  a  man  as  the  imaginary 
Richard  j  the  second  gives  us  only  the  opinion  of  the  imaginary 
Hamlet,  For  every  word  in  a  play  some  imaginary  speaker,  and 
only  he,  is  responsible ;  and  thus  in  dramatic  Hterature  no  amount 
of  quotations  can  give  us  the  mind  of  the  poet  or  the  meaning 
of  the  poem. 

In  what  way  then  are  we  to  seek  the  moral  significance  of  the 
Shakespearean  Drama?  In  the  first  place,  the  principle  must  be 
consistently  followed  that  all  the  speeches  of  a  play  must  be  read 
with  regard  to  the  character  of  the  speaker,  and  to  the  circum- 
stances in  which  he  speaks.    But  to  this  principle  another  may  be 


INTRODUCTION  3 

r~ 
added.  The  treatment  of  the  subject  in  the  present  work  assumes 
as  its  basis  the  study  of  plot.  Plot  is  the  reduction  of  all  the 
details  of  a  poem  to  a  unity  of  design.  It  is  in  fiction  what 
providence  is  in  the  world  of  reality.  As  we  contemplate  the  vast 
universe  we  delight  to  believe  that  — 

All  are  but  parts  of  one  stupendous  whole  : 

the  religious  mind  instinctively  feels  this ;  science  is  occupied  in 
taking  the  phenomenal  universe  to  pieces  and  tracing  the  parts  of 
which  it  is  made  up.  So  in  the  mimic  world  of  a  drama  or  story, 
all  are  but  parts  of  one  artistic  whole  :  the  cultured  mind  has  an 
instinctive  sense  of  such  plot ;  criticism  takes  the  drama  or  story 
to  pieces  and  analyses  the  parts  which  have  been  moulded  into  a 
unity.  Every  single  play  of  Shakespeare  will  be  a  microcosm,  of 
which  the  author  is  the  creator,  and  the  plot  is  its  providential 
scheme.  When  analysis  of  the  various  plays  has  put  together 
results  drawn  from  each,  then  we  have  a  body  of  material  suffi- 
cient for  the  study  of  underlying  principles,  and  —  so  far  as  may 
be  —  for  the  coordination  of  principles  into  something  of  a  moral 
system. 

But  is  such  work  worth  doing?  it  will  be  asked.  Plays  are  a 
form  of  human  amusement ;  in  the  case  of  Shakespeare,  no  doubt, 
the  enjoyment  will  be  of  an  elevating  character,  still  it  will  be  in 
the  category  of  amusement.  If  we  go  beyond  this,  are  we  not  in 
danger  of  spoiling  good  sport  in  order  to  make  doubtful  philos- 
ophy? 

The  answer  to  this  question  will  depend  upon  the  meaning  the 
particular  reader  attaches  to  the  word  poetry.  The  tyranny  of 
words  is  great :  the  fact  that  the  word  prose  has  a  double  usage, 
contrasting  sometimes  with  poetry  and  sometimes  with  verse,  has 
brought  it  about  that  in  many  minds  poetry  has  come  to  mean 
verse,  or,  at  least,  poetry  is  conceived  as  only  a  mode  of  expres- 
sion. But  poetry  is  also  a  mode  of  thought :  its  root  significance 
is  creation.  The  philosopher  and  the  poet  are  ahke  thinkers,  but 
they  express  their  thinking  in  different  forms;  the  philosopher 


4  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

thinks  in  abstract  principles  and  arguments,  the  poet  expresses  his 
thoughts  in  the  concrete,  in  the  illustrative  examples  he  creates. 
The  two  types  meet  in  physical  science.  Now,  the  physicist  is  a 
philosopher,  conveying  what  he  has  observed  of  nature  in  laws  and 
inductions.  At  another  time,  in  what  he  calls  experiments,  the 
physicist  creates  :  he  contrives,  at  his  arbitrary  will,  peculiar  com- 
binations, which  would  not  be  brought  into  existence  but  for  him, 
and  obedient  nature  exhibits  what  her  working  would  do  under 
these  conditions.  In  a  similar  way  poetry  and  fiction  are  an  experi- 
mental side  to  the  philosophy  of  human  life.  History,  biography, 
psychology,  ethics,  correspond  to  the  physicist's  mere  observation 
of  nature ;  these  studies  limit  the  material  they  use  to  what  hap- 
pens to  have  happened.  Poetry  and  fiction  use  the  same  material 
of  human  life  without  limiting  it  to  what  has  chanced  actually  to 
occur ;  all  that  would  naturally  happen  in  the  conditions  contrived 
makes  the  material  of  creative  literature,  which  can  thus  give  to 
its  treatment  of  human  life  all  the  range  of  crucial  experiment. 

I  say  boldly,  that  the  study  of  human  life  will  never  hold  its 
own,  in  comparison  with  the  study  of  physical  nature,  until  we 
recognise  the  true  position  of  poetry  and  fiction  in  philosophy. 
Our  present  confinement  of  moral  studies  to  histories  and  abstract 
ethics  holds  the  humanities  back  in  the  elementary  stage  of  obser- 
vation without  experiment.  More  than  this,  the  survey  of  life  that 
bounds  itself  by  facts  is  not  even  the  best  kind  of  observation :  it 
is  like  the  timid  examination  of  nature  by  one  who  will  use  noth- 
ing but  the  naked  eye.  The  Hfe  that  is  close  around  observers  is 
an  eddying  whirl  of  unrelated  particulars  ;  what  more  is  wanted 
to  make  particulars  into  the  general  ideas  we  call  truth  is  either 
too  far  off  to  be  seen,  or  so  near  as  to  be  out  of  perspective.  The 
same  difficulty  in  the  observation  of  nature  we  meet  by  the  use  of 
the  telescope  and  the  microscope ;  it  is  true  that  when  we  look 
through  these  we  do  not  see  things  but  the  images  of  things,  yet 
it  is  only  by  aid  of  such  images  that  we  can  get  nature  at  the 
proper  distance  for  observation.  The  poetic  mind  is  the  lens  pro- 
vided by  nature  for  human  life ;  *  works  of  imagination '  are  so 


INTRODUCTION  5 

called  because  they  give  us  the  '  images '  of  human  things,  cleared 
from  the  vagueness  of  too  great  distance,  or  the  obscurity  caused 
by  irrelevant  details.  The  Shakespearean  Drama  constitutes  a  vast 
body  of  such  creative  observations  in  human  Hfe,  made  through  a 
peerless  instrument ;  they  invite  arrangement  and  disposition  into 
general  truths. 

Objections  felt  in  some  quarters  against  the  sort  of  study  here 
attempted  will  often  be  found  to  resolve  themselves  into  miscon- 
ception of  poetry  and  its  creative  function.  Men  of  affairs  often 
make  themselves  merry  at  the  expense  of  the  scholarship  that 
brings  elaborate  discussion  to  bear  upon  what  after  all  is  purely 
imaginative  material.  "If  Shakespeare  be  not"  —  I  quote  in 
substance  a  newspaper  article  —  "  the  most  muddled,  unintelligi- 
ble and  inchoate  genius  that  ever  handled  a  pen,  why  should  he 
need  by  way  of  explanation  commentaries  in  volume  far  exceed- 
ing the  vvhole  volume  of  the  plays  ?  "  The  writer  of  these  words 
has  not  seen  that  only  an  infinitesimally  small  portion  of  Shake- 
speare commentaries  —  and  that,  in  my  judgment,  the  portion 
which  could  best  be  spared  —  is  commentary  on  Shakespeare. 
The  vast  proportion  is  comment  upon  human  hfe  itself,  touched 
as  hfe  is  at  myriad  points  by  the  creations  of  the  Shakespearean 
Drama.  Discussion  of  human  life  is  likely  to  go  on  gathering  both 
volume  and  value  to  the  end  of  time. 

Other  objectors  readily  admit  the  general  principle;  but,  they 
ask,  is  Shakespeare  up  to  date  in  his  psychology  and  ethics  ? 
Similarly,  I  imagine,  many  a  tailor,  visiting  a  public  gallery  of 
paintings,  is  convinced  in  his  heart  that  Vandyck  was  not  up  to 
date  in  his  fashions.  For  there  is  even  in  grave  studies  an  ele-. 
ment  of  fashion ;  particular  problems  have  prominence  at  particu- 
lar times,  and  the  technical  terms  associated  with  them  recur  with 
insistent  emphasis ;  the  fascination  of  being  up  to  date  somewhat 
disturbs  perspective,  and  the  psychology  that  does  not  run  into 
current  moulds  seems  to  be  no  psychology  at  all.  But  the  im- 
portant point  is  that  Shakespeare  is  not  a  psychologist,  elementary 
or  advanced,   in  the  sense  in  which  the  word  is  used  by  the 


6  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

objector ;  Shakespeare's  work  is  to  project  upon  the  screen  of  our 
imagination  pieces  of  human  life,  which  it  is  for  general  psychology 
and  ethics  to  analyse.  And  if  any  student  has  a  system  of  psy- 
chology and  ethics  which  will  not  bear  confronting  with  the  life 
revealed  by  Shakespeare,  it  might  be  well  for  him  to  doubt 
whether  his  system  may  not  be  one-sided,  rather  than  that  the 
insight  of  Shakespeare  should  be  antiquated. 

A  more  reasonable  doubt  is,  how  far  such  study  of  the  dramas 
can  be  reduced  to  a  system.  Indeed,  I  cannot  help  thinking  that 
the  drawback  to  most  of  the  existing  commentaries  on  Shake- 
speare is  that  they  lean  towards  over-systematisation ;  with  full 
intention  of  inductive  examination,  investigators  have  nevertheless 
approached  their  work  with  an  unconscious  bias  towards  neat 
Kl  /'generalisations  and  rounded  coordinations.^  For  myself,  I  am 
^  j  content  to  draw  nothing  more  of  system  out  of  the  world  of 
'  \  Shakespeare's  creations  than  may  be  drawn  from  the  world  of  real 
life.  None  of  us  beHeve  the  world  about  us  to  be  a  mere  chaos. 
The  sifted  life  that  is  held  up  for  our  observation  by  Shakespeare 
will  similarly  show  underlying  principles ;  every  degree  of  success 
in  discovering  and  coordinating  moral  ideas  in  the  Drama  may 
lay  claim  to  the  broad  sense  of  the  word  system. 

It  remains  to  ask,  how  far  we  are  to  extend  the  range  of  the 
word  moral  in  treating  the  moral  system  of  Shakespeare.  In  the 
first  place,  we  are  open  to  consider  all  that  touches  character,  the 
ways  of  men,  the  aims,  motives,  impulses,  whether  of  individuals 
or  classes :  all  that  is  covered  by  the  Latin  word  mores.  So  far 
as  this  goes  we  are  on  the  same  ground  as  the  science  of  ethics. 
But,  though  it  would  seem  as  if  the  Latin  word  morals  and  the 
Greek  word  ethics  were  exact  counterparts  one  of  the  other,  yet  in 
usage  and  common  thought  the  conception  of  morals  extends 
much  beyond  the  science  of  ethics. 

1  Professor  Dowden's  Mind  and  Art  of  Shakspere  is  an  exception.  I  entirely 
concur  in  the  spirit  of  his  remark  (page  429)  :  "  Let  us  not  attenuate  Shakspere 
to  a  theory  " :  though  my  title  may  seem  a  contradiction.  The  question  is  simply 
how  far  the  word  system  is  to  be  pressed. 


INTRODUCTION  7 

We  think  of  a  moral  system  as  including,  not  only  the  aspect 
which  the  individual  shows  to  the  universe,  but  also  the  aspect 
which  the  course  of  events  in  the  universe  shows  to  the  individual.; 
Varieties  of  character,  and  variations  of  fortune  or  fate,  are  ele- 
ments which  must  combine  to  give  the  idea  of  a  moral  order  in 
the  world.  It  is  here  that  the  great  questions  of  a  moral  system 
arise.  An  influential  school  of  commentators  on  drama,  corre- 
sponding to  a  school  that  has  always  existed  among  thinkers  on 
real  life,  stand  for  the  rigid  connection  of  men's  moral  natures 
with  their  fortunes :  that  a  man's  character  determines  his  fate. 
This  they  bring  as  an  axiom  to  their  analysis  of  drama,  and  insist 
on  discovering  their  axiom,  as  a  self-evident  principle,  in  every 
story.  They  even  quote  Scripture  for  it :  Whatsoever  a  man 
soweth,  that  shall  he  also  reap.  But  this  last  is  another  example 
of  the  Fallacy  of  Quotations.  The  words  appear  in  Scripture  as  a 
gnome  or  proverb,  which  is  the  literary  form  devoted  to  express- 
ing partial  truths ;  it  is  misquotation  to  cite  a  proverb  as  if  this 
were  intended  for  a  universal  truth.  It  is  of  course  one  of  the 
many  tendencies  observable  in  life  that  what  is  sown  in  conduct  is 
likely  to  be  reaped ;  such  reaping  of  what  has  been  sown  always 
strikes  the  beholder  with  profound  moral  impressiveness.  But  it 
is  only  one  tendency  out  of  many :  the  facts  of  human  life  also 
reveal  men  failing  to  reap  what  they  have  sown,  or  again  being 
forced  to  reap  what  others  have  sown.  The  same  Bible  which 
gives  us  at  one  point  the  impressive  proverb  of  sowing  and  reap- 
ing, gives  us  at  another  point  the  not  less  impressive  parable  of  the 
sower  who  goes  forth  to  sow,  and  tells  how  some  of  his  seed  fell 
by  the  wayside,  and  some  into  stony  ground  or  among  thorns : 
warning  us  that  what  is  sown  is  not  always  reaped.  I  touch  on 
this  point  only  to  insist  that  we  must  come  to  our  study  of  Shake- 
speare with  an  open  mind,  and  gather  from  each  story  as  it  pre- 
sents itself  whatever  shall  appear  as  to  the  connection  between 
character  and  fate. 

When  we  thus  consider  side  by  side  the  characters  of  men  and 
the  course  of  events  another  branch  of  inquiry  will  naturally  sug- 


8  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

gest  itself.  What,  in  the  moral  system  of  Shakespeare,  appear  to 
be  the  forces  behind  Ufe,  determining  its  issues?  Are  the  conse- 
quences of  our  actions  regulated  only  by  general  laws,  such  as 
those  we  recognise  in  the  reaction  of  physical  forces?  While  I 
hold  a  ball  in  my  hand,  I  may  choose  whether  I  will  throw  it  to 
the  right  or  to  the  left ;  but  when  once  the  ball  has  left  my  hand  it 
is  seized  upon  by  the  law  of  gravitation  and  the  laws  of  friction 
and  of  projectile  curve ;  nothing  but  the  play  of  such  laws  deter- 
mines where  the  ball  will  touch  the  ground.  Is  it  so  with  the 
actions  of  the  moral  life  ?  Or  is  it  —  as  when  Arthur  threw  away 
Excalibur  and  a  hand  appeared  from  the  lake  to  seize  it  —  that 
there  is  an  external  Will  at  times  interfering  with  natural  conse- 
quences of  men's  acts  ?  Or  again,  have  we  assumed  too  much  in 
saying  that  while  in  my  hand  the  ball  is  in  my  control  ?  and  is  it 
that  unconscious  forces  from  within  us  may  have  interfered  even 
with  the  actions  we  call  voluntary?  Such  questions  suggest  that 
the  forces  of  life,  so  far  as  they  find  dramatic  expression  in  Shake- 
spearean plot,  make  a  natural  part  of  his  moral  system. 

One  more  principle  must  be  indicated  as  defining  the  field  of 
the  present  inquiry.  I  have  so  far  spoken  as  if  there  were  no  dif- 
ference between  life  as  it  is  depicted  in  the  drama  and  the  Hfe  of 
reality.  And  indeed  the  common  idea  that  the  two  are  identical 
has  been  assisted  by  a  certain  image  —  attributed,  by  the  usual 
Fallacy  of  Quotations,  to  Shakespeare,  but  in  reality  canying  only 
the  authority  of  Hamlet  —  the  description  of  the  stage  as  "  holding 
up  the  mirror  to  nature."  The  comparison  is  apt  enough  for  the 
purpose  of  Hamlet's  speech.  But  that  the  drama  is  not  merely  a 
reflection  of  real  Hfe  every  reader  may  satisfy  himself,  by  imagining 
his  own  life  and  the  life  of  his  household  on  the  day  on  which 
he  reads  these  lines  reproduced  —  by  phonograph  and  kinetograph 
—  without  any  flaw  upon  some  stage  :  would  this  be  drama?  Ob- 
viously something  would  be  lacking  to  make  the  reproduction  of 
real  life  into  drama,  something  of  the  nature  of  sifting,  selection, 
adaptation.  It  appears  then  that  drama  is  not  a  reflection,  but  an 
arranged  spectacle.    Now  a  spectacle  implies  a  spectator ;  and  the 


INTRODUCTION  9 

whole  arrangement  is  contrived  with  .regard  to  the  spectator's 
point  of  view.  This  standpoint  of  the  spectator  enters  fundament- 
ally into  all  dramatic  analysis.  When  we  use  such  elementary 
terms  as  '  tragic/  '  comic,'  we  assume  in  their  use  the  spectator's 
view  point ;  we  call  the  experience  of  MalvoUo  comic,  yet  it  would 
be  the  reverse  of  comic  to  Malvolio.  When  Aristotle  gives  his 
famous  definition  of  tragedy,  as  purifying  the  emotions  of  pity 
and  terror  by  a  healthy  exercise  of  them,  it  is  obviously  the  spec- 
tator's emotions  with  which  his  definition  is  concerned.  Similarly 
the  present  inquiry,  besides  plot,  must  give  attention  to  dramatic 
*  tone '  —  the  technical  expression  for  such  differences  as  tragic, 
comic,  humorous,  and  all  their  varieties  and  shadings.  The  moral 
system  of  Shakespeare  will  be  traced  ahke  in  plot,  the  course  of 
events  appearing  in  the  play,  and  in  tone,  the  sympathetic  response 
of  the  spectator. 

With  these  preliminary  observations  the  chapters  that  follow  may 
be  left  to  explain  themselves.  The  inquiry  falls  into  three  natural 
parts.  In  the  first,  particular  dramas  will  be  presented  to  illustrate 
what  may  be  recognised  as  root  ideas  in  the  moral  system  of 
Shakespeare.  Then  the  inquiry  will  widen,  and  survey  the  world 
of  Shakespeare's  creation  in  its  moral  complexity.  In  the  third 
part  will  be  considered  the  forces  of  life  in  Shakespeare's  moral 
world,  so  far  as  these  express  themselves  in  dramatic  forms,  from 
personal  will  at  one  end  of  the  scale  to  overruling  providence  at 
the  other  end. 


BOOK   I 

ROOT  IDEAS   OF  SHAKESPEARE'S  MORAL 
SYSTEM 

Chapter      I :  Heroism  and  Moral  Balance :  The  first  four  Histories 

Chapter    II :  Wrong  and  Retribution :  The  second  four  Histories 

Chapter  III:  Innocence  and  Pathos:    The  Tragedy  of  Romeo  and 
Juliet 

Chapter  IV:  Wrong  and  Restoration:    The  Comedies  of  Winter's 
Tale  and  Cymbeline 

Chapter     V:  The  Life  Without  and  the  Life  Within:  The  Mask- 
Tragedy  of  Henry  the  Eighth 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL  BALANCE  :    THE  FIRST   FOUR 
HISTORIES 

Without  doubt  Henry  of  Monmouth  is  to  be  regarded  as  the 
grand  hero  of  the  Shakespearean  wo  dd.  It  is  ,m  approaching 
this  theme  that  the  dramatist  feels' the  limitations  ot  dramatic  form. 

O  for  a  Muse  of  fire,  that  would  ascexid' ;  > 'J  \  ';  ]  /I\ 

The  brightest  heaven  of  invention, 

A  kingdom  for  a  stage,  princes  to  act 

And  monarchs  to  behold  the  swelling  scene! 

Then  should  the  warlike  Harry,  like  himself, 

Assume  the  port  of  Mars ;  and  at  his  heels, 

LeashM  in  like  hounds,  should  famine,  sword  and  fire 

Crouch  for  employment. 

The  historic  materials  hmit  what  follows  to  a  picture  of  war.  But 
wise  counsellors  of  the  King  —  not  speaking  in  the  presence, 
which  might  suggest  flattery,  but  in  secret  conference  with  one 
another  —  indicate  the  universal  genius  of  Henry. 

Hear  him  but  reason  in  divinity, 

And  all-admiring  with  an  inward  wish 

You  would  desire  the  King  were  made  a  prelate : 

Hear  him  debate  of  commonwealth  affairs. 

You  would  say  it  hath  been  all  in  all  his  study : 

List  his  discourse  of  war,  and  you  shall  hear 

A  fearfiil  battle  render'd  you  in  music : 

Turn  him  to  any  cause  of  policy. 

The  Gordian  knot  of  it  he  will  unloose, 

Familiar  as  his  garter :  that,  when  he  speaks, 

The  air,  a  charter'd  libertine,  is  still. 

And  the  mute  wonder  lurketh  in  men's  ears. 

To  steal  his  sweet  and  honey'd  sentences.^ 

i  Nen/y  the  Fifth  :\.\.  38. 
13 


14  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Thus  the  great  dramatist  must  needs  borrow  from  a  sister  art,  and 
narrative  poems  fill  up  the  intervals  between  the  acts,  epic  com- 
bining with  drama  to  make  a  medium  wide  enough  for  the  pres- 
entation of  the  complete  hero. 

Yet  at  first  sight  it  might  seem  as  if  a  great  exception  would 
have  to  be  made  to  the  moral  greatness  of  Henry.  This  kingly 
figure  has  been,  in  his  youth,  the  grief  of  his  father's  heart,  the 
prodigal  son  of  court  life ;  affections  holding  a  wing  "  quite  from 
the  flight  o*!  all  his  ancestors ''  have  kept  him  wasting  his  years  in 
the  riotous  living  of  low  tavern^  and  street  brawls.  But  a  closer 
examination  ef  Henry  as  he  is  .leen  developing  through  the  series 
of  plays  will  put  quite  another  face  upon  this  matter.  The  truancy 
of  the  prince  is  no  more  than  the  wider  and  fuller  nature  rebelling^ 
against  the  limitations  of  worn-out  ideals.  Bohngbroke  and  those 
about  him  belong  to  the  past ;  theirs  is  a  life  bounded  by  the  nar- 
row horizon  of  feudalism.  Their  business  is  war,  and  their  justice 
is  judicial  combat ;  the  war  moreover  is  a  war  of  feudal  parties  for 
feudal  power.  The  divinity  of  kingship  is  a  sentiment  with  them, 
but  only  while  it  is  on  their  side.  Bolingbroke,  while  he  is  weak, 
bends  the  knee  before  Richard ;  when  unexpected  powers  have 
flocked  to  his  standard  he  overturns  Richard's  throne  and  appro- 
priates the  divine  kingship  to  himself.  The  Percies  have  been  his 
chief  backers  in  this ;  the  moment  the  new  King  turns  against  their 
family  they  discover  that  Richard  was  a  "  sweet  rose  "  and  Boling- 
broke its  "canker."  Now  Henry  of  Monmouth  has  been  born 
into  a  new  era,  when  the  one-sided  structure  of  feudalism  is  to 
break  down,  and  society  is  to  find  a  new  equilibrium ;  his  youthfiil 
freshness  has  caught  the  new  interest  of  human  nature  itself,  the 
interest  of  Hfe  outside  feudal  conceptions.  Responsibility  and  the 
call  to  action  have  not  yet  come ;  Henry  can  afford  to  stand  aside, 
and  let  the  factions  eat  up  one  another.  Meanwhile,  what  are 
attractions  to  the  men  of  the  time  have  no  zest  for  him  :  a  mere 
show  of  feudal  Hfe  in  mimic  spectacle  as  a  rehef  from  feudal  Hfe  in 
dull  earnest.  When  they  tell  the  prince  of  the  "  Oxford  triumphs  " 
that  were  to  celebrate  successful  treason  — 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL   BALANCE  15 

His  answer  was,  he  would  unto  the  stews, 
And  from  the  commonest  creature  pluck  a  glove. 
And  wear  it  as  a  favour ;  and  with  that 
He  would  unhorse  the  lustiest  challenger.^ 

All  this  is  but  the  breath  of  change  stirring,  that  is  to  mark  a 
new  generation.  But  curiosity  grows  in  time  to  be  something 
deeper ;  slowly  observers  of  Henry  come  to  see  that  he  is  "  ob- 
scuring his  contemplation  under  the  veil  of  wildness."  ^ 

This  is  not  an  afterthought,  put  forward  to  excuse  a  life  that 
has  been  misspent.  The  first  scene  in  which  we  view  Henry  sur- 
rounded by  the  Falstaff  crew  ends  with  a  soliloquy.^ 

I  know  you  all,  and  will  a  while  uphold 
The  unyoked  humour  of  your  idleness  : 
Yet  herein  will  I  imitate  the  sun, 
Who  doth  permit  the  base  contagious  clouds 
To  smother  up  his  beauty  from  the  world, 
That,  when  he  please  again  to  be  himself. 
Being  wanted,  he  may  be  more  wondered  at, 
By  breaking  through  the  foul  and  ugly  mists 
Of  vapours  that  did  seem  to  strangle  him. 

Meanwhile,  it  is  not  a  case  of  a  Haroun  al  Raschid  viewing  low 
life  under  protection  of  night  and  disguise  :  Henry  casts  off  all 
his  rank,  and  meets  human  nature  on  its  own  level.  He  matches 
himself  against  the  prince  of  humorists,  and  Falstaff  can  never 
get  the  better  of  him.  He  goes  on  to  "  sound  the  base-string  of 
humility,"  and  can  out-trifle  "  a  leash  of  drawers." 

They  take  it  already  upon  their  salvation,  that  though  I  be 
but  Prince  of  Wales,  yet  I  am  the  king  of  courtesy ;  and  tell 
me  flatly  I  am  no  proud  Jack,  like  Falstaff",  but  a  Corinthian, 
a  lad  of  mettle,  a  good  boy,  by  the  Lord,  so  they  call  me, 
and  when  I  am  king  of  England  I  shall  command  all  the 
good  lads  in  Eastcheap.* 

1  Richard  the  Second:  V.  iii.  16.  ^  /  Henry  the  Fourth  :  L  ii.  219. 

2  Henry  the  Fifth  :  I.  i.  63.  4  /  Henry  the  Fourth  ;  IL  iv.  9. 


1 6  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Nothing  comes  in  sight  but  Henry  will  master  it. 

I  am  now  of  all  humours  that  have  showed  themselves 
humours  since  the  old  days  of  goodman  Adam  to  the 
pupil  age  of  this  present  twelve  o'clock  at  midnight. ^ 

He  is  steady  in  his  purpose  of  being  in  gay  life  without  being  of 
it ;  with  easy  superiority  he  sits  loose  to  the  actions  of  his  com- 
rades, and  if  these  have  done  damage  he  repays  "  with  advantage."  ^ 
Henry's  claim  is  that  "  in  everything  the  purpose  must  weigh  with 
the  folly  "  ;  ^  and  it  is  a  folly  that  never  loses  sight  of  wisdom. 

Well,  thus  we  play  the  fools  with  the  time,  and  the 
spirits  of  the  wise  sit  in  the  clouds  and  mock  us.* 

At  last  the  wiser  among  the  old  generation  begin  to  recognise  in 
the  prince's  life  that  there  is  more  than  appears  on  the  surface. 

Warwick.   My  gracious  lord,  you  look  beyond  him  quite  : 
The  prince  but  studies  his  companions 
Like  a  strange  tongue,  wherein,  to  gain  the  language, 
'Tis  needful  that  the  most  immodest  word 
Be  look'd  upon  and  learn'd ;  which  once  attain'd, 
Your  highness  knows,  comes  to  no  further  use 
But  to  be  known  and  hated.     So,  like  gross  terms, 
The  prince  will  in  the  perfectness  of  time 
Cast  off  his  followers  ;  and  their  memory 
Shall  as  a  pattern  or  a  measure  live, 
By  which  his  grace  must  mete  the  lives  of  others, 
Turning  past  evils  to  advantages.^ 

That  a  wider  and  more  balanced  nature  is  the  explanation  of 
the  prince's  truancy  is  the  more  evident  the  more  he  is  compared 
with  the  men  of  his  age.  Henry's  father  is  the  last  to  understand 
him.     Bolingbroke's  was  a  soul  tuned  to  a  single  string ;  his  serious- 

1  /  Henry  the  Fourth :  II.  iv.  104.  * //  Henry  the  Fourth  :  II.  ii.  154. 

2  /  Henry  the  Fourth  ;  II .  iv,  599.  «  //  Henry  the  Fourth :  IV.  iv.  67. 
8  //  Henry  the  Fourth  :  II.  ii.  196. 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL  BALANCE  \J 

ness  has  been  an  ambition  in  which  the  dazzle  of  the  crown  has 
Winded  to  all  moral  distinctions;  or  if  he  is  haunted  with  a  sense 
of  guilt,  he  cherishes  the  purpose  of  a  crusade  to  the  Holy  Land 
for  atonement.  In  the  long  scenes  between  father  and  son  we 
have  simplicity  in  the  chair  of  authority,  seeking  to  mould  to  his 
own  narrowness  a  character  he  is  unable  to  fathom.  Bolingbroke 
even  goes  so  far  as  to  hold  up  to  his  son  the  example  of  his  own 
youthful  days.^  Now  we  know  how  Bolingbroke's  young  manhood 
impressed  contemporaries. 

.  .  .  His  courtship  to  the  common  people ; 
How  he  did  seem  to  dive  into  their  hearts 
With  humble  and  familiar  courtesy  ... 
Off  goes  his  bonnet  to  an  oyster-wench  ; 
A  brace  of  draymen  bid  God  speed  him  well 
And  had  the  tribute  of  his  supple  knee.^ 

But,  with  a  naivete  worthy  of  Polonius  explaining  policy  to  his 
servant.  King  Bolingbroke  impresses  on  his  son  that  all  this  famil- 
iarity had  a  treasonable  purpose  under  it. 

By  being  seldom  seen,  I  could  not  stir 

But  like  a  comet  I  was  wonder'd  at ; 

That  men  would  tell  their  children,  'This  is  he'; 

Others  would  say,  'Where,  which  is  Bolingbroke'? 

And  then  I  stole  all  courtesy  from  heaven, 

And  dress'd  myself  in  such  humility 

That  I  did  pluck  allegiance  from  men's  hearts, 

Loud  shouts  and  salutations  from  their  mouths, 

Even  in  the  presence  of  the  crowned  King. 

Against  this  as  background  the  reader  of  the  scene  feels  Henry's 
pranks  to  be  almost  respectable.  The  prince  receives  all  this 
long-winded  rebuking  with  filial  deference ;  and  these  scenes  all 

'^  I  Henry  the  Fourth:  III.  ii,  from  39. 
^  Richard  the  Second :  \.  iv.  24. 


1 8  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

end  happily,  for  the  charm  of  Henry's  personal  presence  is  as 
irresistible  to  his  father  as  to  Falstaff.  The  last  encounter  of  king 
and  prince  is  characteristic  of  the  two  natures.^  Bolingbroke, 
dying,  must  needs  have  the  golden  crown  by  his  bedside,  to  gaze 
on  to  the  last.  Henry  (believing  his  father  dead)  places  the 
crown  on  his  own  head ;  little  impressed  as  he  has  been  by  the 
glitter  of  royalty,  now  that  the  crown  has  come  to  him  by  "  lineal 
honour,"  Henry  will  guard  it  against  a  world  in  arms,  and  walks 
aside  to  reaUse  the  new  sense  of  responsibiUty.  BoUngbroke 
shrieks  at  finding  his  crown  gone,  and  can  still  see  no  explanation 
but  the  vulgar  hurry  of  a  libertine  for  succession  to  means  of  free 
license.  The  misunderstanding  is  easily  removed,  and  then  the 
finally  reconciled  father  gives  his  son  his  dying  advice  :  —  which  is 
to  distract  a  kingdom  with  foreign  wars  as  a  preventive  against 
too  close  scrutiny  of  the  royal  title. 

Or  is  it  with  the  young  men  of  the  time  that  Henry  is  to  be 
compared  ?  There  is  Richard,  king  in  esse  and  not  in  posse ^  prosti- 
tuting to  his  own  lusts  the  divine  kingship  in  which  all  beheve. 
Or  there  is  Aumerle,  faithful  plotter  for  his  hero  Richard,  until  the 
moment  of  personal  danger  sends  him  rushing  to  Bolingbroke  with 
abject  prayers  for  pardon.^  There  is  above  all  John  of  Lancaster, 
who  has  taken  his  elder  brother's  place  in  council.  The  Prince 
of  Wales,  the  moment  he  obeys  the  call  to  arms,  becomes  the 
hero  of  the  war ;  without  a  spark  of  rivalry,  nevertheless,  Henry 
extols  Lancaster's  prowess  as  beyond  his  own ;  in  the  time  of 
victory  he  obtains  the  royal  permission  to  release  Douglas,  and 
turning  over  to  his  brother  the  office  of  freeing  the  prisoner 
almost  warms  Lancaster  to  a  sense  of  generosity.  Later  on  an 
independent  command  gives  to  this  "  demure  boy "  an  oppor- 
tunity to  show  his  true  nature :  Lancaster's  fetch  of  policy  proves 
to  be  a  solemn  quibble  under  which  he  perpetrates  an  act  of  the 
blackest  treachery.^ 

1  //  Henry  the  Fourth  :  IV,  v. 

2  Richard  the  Second  :  V.  il,  iii. 

8  /  Henry  th(  Fourth :  V.  iv,  v ;  //  Henry  the  Fourth  :  IV.  ii. 


HEROISM  AND  MORAL  BALANCE  1 9 

It  is  however  Hotspur  who  is  the  ideal  of  youth  to  BoHngbroke 
and  his  feudal  generation  : 

Amongst  a  grove,  the  very  straightest  plant ; 
Who  is  sweet  Fortune's  minion  and  her  pride ; 

.  .  .  O  that  it  could  be  proved 
That  some  night-tripping  fairy  had  exchanged 
In  cradle-clothes  our  children  where  they  lay, 
And  caird  mine  Percy,  his  Plantagenet! 

Yet  viewed  from  any  other  standpoint  than  that  of  feudalism  Hot- 
spur appears  to  be  only  a  fighting  animal,  with  riotous  eloquence 
to  mouth  his  riotous  thoughts.  When  he  rouses  his  mighty  spirit 
against  the  King,  it  is  his  own  fellow-conspirators  who  speak  of 
him  as  "  drunk  with  choler,"  in  a  "  mad  heat "  pouring  forth  "  a 
world  of  figures " ;  to  use  his  own  words,  he  is  "  whipp'd  and 
scourged  with  rods,  nettled  and  stung  with  pismires  "  at  merely 
hearing  of  "  this  vile  poHtician,  Bolingbroke."  ^  Careless  as  to  pos- 
session, he  will  nevertheless  "  cavil  on  the  ninth  part  of  a  hair," 
if  it  be  a  question  of  bargaining.^  He  can  respect  no  type  of  hfe 
but  his  own :  he  risks  the  alliance  which  is  the  only  hope  of  his 
cause  in  order  to  mock  in  Glendower  a  different  tone  of  grandi- 
osity from  his  own  fire-eating ;  the  ballad  which  is  charming  all 
other  ears  is  to  Hotspur  no  better  than  the  mewing  of  a  cat ;  it 
seems  to  offend  his  Englishship  that  a  Welshman  should  talk 
Welsh.^  When  one  after  another  of  the  concerted  movements 
fails  at  the  rendezvous  Hotspur  speaks  as  if  this  were  encourag- 
ing, so  great  is  his  itch  to  fight ;  it  is  his  own  comrades  who  de- 
nounce the  imaginative  madness  which  has  brought  the  cause  to 
its  ruin.'*  Such  mere  battle  passion  seems  as  irresponsible  a  thing 
as  Henry's  gayeties  ;  it  is  noteworthy  that  Percy's  word  as  the  sword 
of  his  conqueror  pierces  him  is  this  — 

O,  Harry,  thou  hast  robb'd  me  oi  my  youth.^ 

1  /  Henry  the  Fourth :  I.  iii,  whole  scene. 

2  /  Henry  the  Fourth  :  III.  i.  140.         8  I  Henry  the  Fourth  :    III.  i,  whole  scene. 
4  /  Henry  the  Fourth :  IV.   i.  76-83,  and  whole  scene ;    //  Henry  the  Fourth : 

I .  iii.  26-33.  •  /  Henry  the  Fourth :  V.  iv.  77. 


20  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Both  the  rivals  use  the  much  abused  word  'honour.' 

Hotspur.     By  heaven,  methinks  it  were  an  easy  leap, 

To  pluck  bright  honour  from  the  pale-faced  moon. 
Or  dive  into  the  bottom  of  the  deep. 
Where  fathom-line  could  never  touch  the  ground. 
And  pluck  up  drowned  honour  by  the  locks. 

At  the  climax  of  his  career  Percy  expresses  his  conception  of  such 

honour : 

An  if  we  live,  we  live  to  tread  on  kings ; 

If  die,  brave  death,  when  princes  die  with  us!^ 

There  comes  a  situation  when  the  other  Henry  exclaims : 

But  if  it  be  a  sin  to  covet  honour, 
I  am  the  most  offending  soul  alive. 

The  honour  he  is  coveting  is  the  post  of  cruel  danger : 

If  we  are  mark'd  to  die,  we  are  enow 

To  do  our  country  loss  ;  and  if  to  live. 

The  fewer  men,  the  greater  share  of  honour. ^ 

How  do  the  two  Harries  appear  when  the  course  of  events  brings 
them  across  one  another's  path  ?  They  tell  Hotspur  of  the  prince 
in  arms  against  his  cause :  he  pours  contempt  upon  the  "  sword- 
and-buckler  Prince  of  Wales,"  and,  but  that  the  King  loves  him 
not,  he  would  have  him  poisoned  with  a  pot  of  ale.  Prince 
Henry's  generous  praise  of  his  rival  is  reported :  Hotspur  is  un- 
moved, and  can  only  conceive  of  the  advancing  general  as  a  wild 
libertine.^  Meanwhile  the  King  has  extolled  Hotspur  to  his  son, 
and  the  easy  prince  at  last  takes  fire. 

Percy  is  but  my  factor,  good  my  lord, 

To  engross  up  glorious  deeds  on  my  behalf; 

1  /  Henry  the  Fourth :  I.  iii.  201 ;  V.  ii.  86, 

2  Her/ry  the  Fifth  :  IV.  iii.  20,  28. 

8  /  Henry  the  Fourth  :  IV.  1,  from  94 ;  V.  ii,  from  46. 


HEROISM   AND    MORAL  BALANCE  21 

And  I  will  call  him  to  so  strict  account, 
That  he  shall  render  every  glory  up, 
Yea,  even  the  sHghtest  worship  of  his  time, 
Or  I  will  tear  the  reckoning  from  his  heart. 

Henry  plunges  into  the  war,  moves  straight  to  his  rival,  redeems 
his  boast  to  the  letter ;  and  then  makes  so  little  of  achievement 
that  he  laughs  while  Falstaff  appropriates  the  deed  to  himself.^ 

Or  there  is  in  the  Dauphin  another  example  of  correct  young 
manhood.  Like  Hotspur,  the  Dauphin  cannot  conceive  of  any 
type  of  life  different  from  his  own ;  what  has  not  been  drawn  to 
its  model  must  needs  be  "a  vain,  giddy,  shallow,  humorous 
youth";  his  seniors  in  vain  seek  to  convince  him  by  facts.^  It 
is  clear  that  the  French  prince  has  never  known  youth  as  a  period 
of  freedom  and  moral  choice ;  his  life  has  merely  been  passing 
through  stages  of  development  of  the  feudal  warrior.  What  ideal- 
ising power  he  possesses  runs  to  the  glorification  of  his  horse. 

Ca,  ha!  he  bounds  from  the  earth  as  if  his  entrails  were 
hairs  ...  he  trots  the  air ;  the  earth  sings  when  he  touches 
it ;  the  basest  horn  of  his  hoof  is  more  musical  than  the  pipe 
of  Hermes.  .  .  .  He  is  pure  air  and  fire;  and  the  dull  ele- 
ments of  earth  and  water  never  appear  in  him,  but  only  in 
patient  stillness  while  his  rider  mounts  him.  .  .  .  The  man 
hath  no  wit  that  cannot,  from  the  rising  of  the  lark  to  the  lodg- 
ing of  the  lamb,  vary  deserved  praise  on  my  palfrey :  it  is  a 
theme  as  fluent  as  the  sea:  turn  the  sands  into  eloquent 
tongues,  and  my  horse  is  argument  for  them  all. 

Yet,  when  the  chivalrous  magnificence  of  this  prince  is  pricked 
by  the  point  of  close  observation,  it  seems  to  collapse  into  a 
somewhat  dubious  courage,  and  this  on  the  testimony  of  military 
comrades. 

Orleans.       The  Dauphin  longs  for  morning. 
Rambures.    He  longs  to  eat  the  English. 

1 1  Henry  the  Fourth  :  IIL  ii.  147;  V.  iv.  161,  and  whole  scene. 
2  Henry  the  Fifth  .•  IL  iv.  30. 


22  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Constable.  I  think  he  will  eat  all  he  kills. 

Orleans.  By  the  white  hand  of  my  lady,  he's  a  gallant  prince. 

Constable.  Swear  by  her  foot,  that  she  may  tread  out  the  oath. 

Orleans.  He  is  simply  the  most  active  gentleman  in  France. 

Constable.  Doing  is  activity ;  and  he  will  still  be  doing. 

Orleans.  He  never  did  any  harm,  that  I  heard  of. 

Constable.  Nor  will  do  none  to-morrow:   he  will  keep  that  good 

name  still. 

Orleans.  I  know  him  to  be  valiant. 

Constable.  I  was  told  that  by  one  that  knows  him  better  than  you. 

Orleans.  What's  he? 

Constable.  Marry,  he  told  me  so  himself;  and  he  said  he  cared  not 

who  knew  it.^ 

These  are  the  types  of  the  old  nobility  with  which  Henry's 
youth  refused  to  be  in  tune.  It  is  abundantly  evident  that  all 
these  have  taken  up  the  strenuous  life  simply  by  reason  of  their 
limitations ;  this  was  all  that  they  had  in  them  to  do.  When  the 
call  comes  Henry  proves  the  most  strenuous  of  them  all:  he 
keeps  his  warlike  father  from  a  faint-hearted  retreat,^  and  is  as 
easily  superior  to  his  military  comrades  as  he  has  been  to  Falstaff 
and  Poins.  But  Henry  has  the  larger  nature,  in  which  action  is 
balanced  by  repose,  accepted  ideals  can  reinforce  themselves  by 
curiosity  and  fresh  interest  in  the  raw  material  of  human  nature. 
To  the  successive  generations  of  men  youth  ever  comes  as  the 
period  of  exploration,  the  wanderjahre  during  which  new  ingre- 
dients may  be  absorbed  for  crystaUisation  into  a  richer  compound ; 
nature's  great  barrier  against  a  specialisation  which  would  settle 
into  hereditary  caste.  In  this  sense  Henry's  is  a  natural  youth. 
But  to  say  this  is  of  course  not  to  justify  all  that  the  prince  does 
in  his  adventurous  nonage.  The  master  temptation  of  the  young 
is  the  desire  to  see  life  for  themselves ;  like  the  hero  of  Ecclesi- 
astesy  they  will  plunge  into  folly  carrying  their  wisdom  with  them. 
Henry  himself  does  not  come  scathless  through  the  ordeal ;  on 
his  own  principles  the  attack  upon  the  Chief  Justice  is  an  outrage, 

1  Henry  the  Fifth :  III.  vii,  whole  scene.  a  /  Henry  the  Fourth  :  V.  iv. 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL  BALANCE  23 

an  outrage  atoned  for  at  the  moment  by  submission,  and  after- 
wards by  the  promotion  of  his  rebuker.  But  the  *  wildness '  of 
the  prince  has  been  a  symptom  of  moral  vigour,  and  its  issue  has 
been  moral  enrichment.  Not  for  a  moment  has  Henry  been 
under  any  spell  of  deception;  he  has  humorously  recognised 
that  he  must  suppress  deeper  feelings  which  the  best  of  his  associ- 
ates were  incapable  of  understanding.^  There  is  thus  no  miracle 
in  the  ease  with  which  he  drops  them. 

Being  awaked,  I  do  despise  my  dream.^ 

But  men  are  known  by  their  dreams.  When  the  new  type  of 
king  is  on  the  throne  it  is  found  that  his  father's  enemies  "  have 
steeped  their  galls  in  honey  ";^  the  wide  human  sympathies  of 
Henry  have  established  his  throne  upon  the  broad  basis  of  a 
people's  love. 

The  play  of  Henry  the  Fifth  presents  the  moral  hero  in  the 
new  hfe  of  responsibility.  It  is  the  same  breadth  and  balance 
of  human  nature  that  is  the  fundamental  impression.  The  fate  of 
history  makes  the  reign  a  single  achievement  of  war.  But  with 
Henry  action  must  be  balanced  by  council.  What  the  first  act 
presents  is  a  total  contrast  to  all  that  the  dying  advice  of  Boling- 
broke  had  forecast;  it  is  bishops  and  aged  statesmen  who  are 
urging  on  war,  the  King  "  in  the  very  May-morn  of  his  youth  " 
who  is  holding  back  with  moral  scruples  and  far-reaching  policy. 
The  moral  question  is  one  of  "  the  law  of  nature  and  of  nations," 
as  the  world  then  understood  them,  and  the  learned  Canterbury 
is  the  legal  adviser  who  must  expound.  But  Henry  makes  the 
most  solemn  of  appeals  for  a  disinterested  judgment. 

And  God  forbid,  my  dear  and  faithful  lord, 

That  you  should  fashion,  wrest,  or  bow  your  reading, 

Or  nicely  charge  your  understanding  soul 

With  opening  titles  miscreate,  whose  right 

1  //  Henry  the  Fourth :  H.  ii.  35-74.  ^  Henry  the  Fifth :  II.  ii.  30. 

2  //  Henry  the  Fourth  :  V.  v.  55. 


24  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Suits  not  in  native  colours  with  the  truth  .  .  . 
Under  this  conjuration  speak,  my  lord ; 
For  we  will  hear,  note  and  believe  in  heart 
That  what  you  speak  is  in  your  conscience  wash'd 
As  pure  as  sin  with  baptism. 

When  in  answer  Canterbury  has  made  his  exposition  of  the  Salic 
law,  the  King  still  forces  his  council  to  look  all  round  the  question 
to  the  furthest  consequences  of  action.  There  comes  at  last  a 
point  where  deliberation  may  crystallise  into  decisive  resolution. 

Now  are  we  well  resolved ;  and,  by  God's  help. 
And  yours,  the  noble  sinews  of  our  power, 
France  being  ours,  we'll  bend  it  to  our  awe, 
Or  break  it  all  to  pieces. 

Not  until  now,  when  the  rights  of  the  question  have  been  debated 
in  calmness  to  a  settlement,  does  Henry  admit  the  embassy  from 
the  Dauphin.  He  listens  to  the  studied  insult  with  dignity ;  in 
answer,  he  first  meets  the  jester  on  his  own  ground  and  outjests 

him. 

When  we  have  match'd  our  rackets  to  these  balls, 
We  will,  in  France,  by  God's  grace,  play  a  set 
Shall  strike  his  father's  crown  into  the  hazard. 
Tell  him,  he  hath  made  a  match  with  such  a  wrangler 
That  all  the  courts  of  France  will  be  disturb'd 
With  chaces. 

The  hint  at  the  wildness  of  his  youth  Henry  turns  against  the 
Dauphin. 

We  never  valued  this  poor  seat  of  England  .  .  . 
But  tell  the  Dauphin  I  will  keep  my  state. 
Be  like  a  king  and  show  my  sail  of  greatness 
When  I  do  rouse  me  in  my  throne  of  France. 

But,  his  indignation  excited  at  such,  playing  with  edge  tools  of  war 
and  national  devastation,  Henry  goes  on  to  the  thought  that  the 
jest  has  turned  tennis-balls  to  gun-stones  : 


HEROISM   AND   MORAL  BALANCE  2$ 

For  many  a  thousand  widows 
Shall  this  his  mock  mock  out  of  their  dear  husbands 
Mock  mothers  from  their  sons,  mock  castles  down  .  .  . 
His  jest  will  savour  but  of  shallow  wit, 
When  thousands  weep  more  than  did  laugh  at  it. 


It  is  important,  for  the  ideal  character  of  the  whole  picture,  that 
this  incident  is  held  back  to  its  proper  place.  Calm  deliberation 
has  yielded  to  decisive  resolution ;  only  then  may  the  adversary's 
insolence  be  used  to  carry  forward  resolution  to  the  white  heat  of 
passion. 

For  a  moment  there  is  an  obstruction  in  the  current  of  events, 
and  heroism  is  seen  against  a  background  of  treason.  What  gives 
dramatic  impressiveness  to  the  second  act  is  this,  that  the  evil  is 
just  as  broad  and  ideal  as  is  the  good  against  which  it  is  arrayed : 
the  passage  that  follows  reads  as  a  counterpart  to  the  bishops' 
expatiation  upon  Henry's  perfections. 

Whatsoever  cunning  fiend  it  was 
That  wrought  upon  thee  so  preposterously 
Hath  got  the  voice  in  hell  for  excellence. 

Show  men  dutiful? 

Why,  so  didst  thou :  seem  they  grave  and  learned? 
Why,  so  didst  thou :  come  they  of  noble  family? 
Why,  so  didst  thou :  seem  they  religious  ? 
Why,  so  didst  thou :  or  are  they  spare  in  diet, 
Free  from  gross  passion  or  of  mirth  or  anger, 
Constant  in  spirit,  not  swerving  with  the  blood, 
Garnish'd  and  deck'd  in  modest  complement, 
Not  working  with  the  eye  without  the  ear, 
And  but  in  purged  judgment  trusting  neither? 
Such  and  so  finely  bolted  didst  thou  seem : 
And  thus  thy  fall  hath  left  a  kind  of  blot. 
To  mark  the  full-fraught  man  and  best  indued 
With  some  suspicion.     I  will  weep  for  thee ; 
For  this  revolt  of  thine,  methinks,  is  like 
Another  fall  of  man. 


26  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

From  the  third  act  the  character  of  Henry  is  seen  concentrated 
in  action :  he  who  was  so  "  modest  in  exception  "  can  now  be 
"  terrible  in  constant  resolution."  Here,  as  ever,  the  force  of  the 
character  seems  to  lie  in  its  balance :  the  most  opposite  qualities 
blend  in  unity  of  purpose. 

In  peace  there's  nothing  so  becomes  a  man 
As  modest  stillness  and  humility : 
But  when  the  blast  of  war  blows  in  our  ears, 
Then  imitate  the  action  of  the  tiger ; 
Stiffen  the  sinews,  summon  up  the  blood. 
Disguise  fair  nature  with  hard-favour'd  rage  .  .  . 
Hold  hard  the  breath,  and  bend  up  every  spirit 
To  his  full  height. 

As  the  spirit  of  peace  can  be  made  a  foil  for  the  spirit  of  war,  so  in 
Henry  mercy  lends  wings  to  fury ;  in  the  general  conduct  of  war 
Henry  acts  on  the  principle  that  "  when  lenity  and  cruelty  play  for 
a  kingdom  the  gentler  gamester  is  the  soonest  winner,"  and  for  that 
very  reason  on  the  eve  of  storm  and  assault  he  can  hold  over  the 
hesitating  foe  the  inevitable  horrors  of  the  flesh'd  soldier,  in  Hberty 
of  bloody  hand  ranging  with  conscience  wide  as  hell.  The  many- 
sided  nature  of  the  King  has  drawn  to  him  all  types  and  orders  of 
men  ;  those  descended  from  fathers  of  war-proof  he  bids  dishonour 
not  their  mothers,  the  good  yeomen  "  whose  limbs  were  made  in 
England  "  he  calls  upon  to  show  the  mettle  of  their  pasture  ;  the 
varied  ranks  around  their  leader  stand  "  like  greyhounds  in  the 
shps  straining  upon  the  start."  Where  in  preceding  reigns  history 
has  been  war  of  factions,  we  have  in  the  war  of  this  play  English, 
Scotch,  Welsh,  Irish,  all  blending  into  a  harmony  of  national 
prowess  and  enthusiasm,  Welsh  Fluellen  leading  the  hero  worship 
with  his  fantastic  glorification  of  Alexander  of  Macedon  and  Harry 
of  Monmouth.^ 

But  the  fulness  of  Henry's  character  can  be  brought  out  only 
by  trouble.     From  the  centre  of  the  play  we  hear  of  pestilence 

1  Henry  the  Fifth  :  IV.  vii. 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL  BALANCE  2/ 

and  famine  :  the  famous  night  piece  that  ushers  in  the  fourth  act 
presents  the  "  poor  condemned  English,"  on  the  night  before  the 
battle,  sitting  patiently  like  sacrifices  by  their  camp  fires,  while 
the  overwhelming  hosts  of  the  enemy  are  staking  to  the  throw  of 
the  dice  their  captives  of  the  morrow. 

O  now,  who  will  behold 
The  royal  captain  of  this  ruin'd  band 
Walking  from  watch  to  watch,  from  tent  to  tent, 
Let  him  cry,  '  Praise  and  glory  on  his  head! ' 
For  forth  he  goes  and  visits  all  his  host. 
Bids  them  good  morrow  with  a  modest  smile, 
And  calls  them  brothers,  friends  and  countrymen. 
Upon  his  royal  face  there  is  no  note 
How  dread  an  army  hath  enrounded  him ; 
Nor  doth  he  dedicate  one  jot  of  colour 
Unto  the  weary  and  all-watched  night, 
But  freshly  looks  and  overbears  attaint 
With  cheerful  semblance  and  sweet  majesty : 
That  every  wretch,  pining  and  pale  before, 
Beholding  him,  plucks  comfort  from  his  looks. 

Through  the  whole  of  the  terrible  crisis  the  force  of  the  army  is 
the  spirit  of  its  King,  responsive  to  every  note  heard  around  him, 
adequate  to  every  call.  He  greets  with  dignity  a  group  of  his 
nobles,  pointing  to  the  first  streaks  of  dawn  : 

There  is  some  soul  of  goodness  in  things  evil  .  .  . 
For  our  bad  neighbour  makes  us  early  stirrers. 

He  turns  to  accost  a  venerable  figure. 

Henry.  Good  morrow,  old  Sir  Thomas  Erpingham : 
A  good  soft  pillow  for  that  good  white  head 
Were  better  than  a  churlish  turf  of  France. 

Erp.        Not  so,  my  liege  :  this  lodging  likes  me  better, 
Since  I  may  say,  "  Now  lie  I  like  a  King." 

With  familiarity  that  charms  the  old  man  Henry  borrows  his  cloak, 
and  in  muffled  disguise  continues  his  passage  through  the  host. 


28  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

He  has  a  bout  of  camp  wit  with  the  unsuspecting  Pistol,  and  hears 
his  own  praises  in  the  old  Eastcheap  slang.  He  marks  some 
pedantic  fussiness  of  Fluellen  as  he  passes  along,  and  sees  beneath 
it  good  qualities  to  be  noted  for  the  future.  Then  he  gets  into  a 
long  chat  with  a  company  of  Enghsh  soldiers,  and  delights  to  keep 
in  play  the  irony  of  the  discussion  about  the  King  :  how  — 

Though  I  speak  it  to  you,  I  think  the  King  is  but  a  man,  as  I 
am :  the  violet  smells  to  him  as  it  doth  to  me ;  the  element 
shows  to  him  as  it  doth  to  me. 

how,  one  suggests,  — 

If  the  cause  be  not  good,  the  King  hath  a  heavy  reckoning  to 
make,  when  all  those  legs  and  arms  and  heads,  chopped  off  in 
a  battle,  shall  join  together  at  the  latter  day.  .  .  . 

how,  on  the  contrary,  — 

Every  subject's  duty  is  the  King's ;  but  every  subject's  soul  is 
his  own.  Therefore  should  every  soldier  in  the  wars  do  as 
every  sick  man  in  his  bed,  wash  every  mote  out  of  his  con- 
science: and  dying  so,  death  is  to  him  advantage;  or  not 
dying,  the  time  was  blessedly  lost  wherein  such  preparation 
was  gained. 

The  thrill  that  goes  through  the  circle  by  the  camp  fire  at  these 
last  words  changes  to  laughter  and  rough  sarcasm,  when  Henry 
slips  for  a  moment  into  a  royal  tone  that  seems  out  of  keeping 
with  his  disguise;  in  another  moment  the  King,  half  angry  and 
half  amused,  finds  himself  shoved  out  of  the  circle,  with  a  gage  in 
his  hand  which  he  has  sworn  to  fight  out  after  the  battle.  But, 
left  alone,  he  realises  with  acute  anguish  the  weight  of  responsi- 
biUty  all  are  putting  upon  "  the  King  "  ;  and  how  this  King  is  but 
a  single  human  heart,  hidden  under  the  thin  veil  of  ceremony.  A 
call  to  battle  is  heard,  and  self-consciousness  for  an  instant  becomes 
an  agony  of  penitence  —  not  for  his  own  sins,  but  for  his  father's, 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL  BALANCE  29 

which  may  be  visited  on  him.^  In  another  moment  he  is  with  his 
army.  Westmoreland  has  just  wished  for  one  ten  thousand  of  those 
men  who  will  be  idle  in  England  that  day.  Henry  will  have  not 
one  more. 

Rather  proclaim  it,  Westmoreland,  through  my  host, 
That  he  which  hath  no  stomach  to  this  fight, 
Let  him  depart ;  his  passport  shall  be  made 
And  crowns  for  convoy  put  into  his  purse : 
We  would  not  die  in  that  man's  company 
That  fears  his  fellowship  to  die  with  us. 

Before  Henry  has  finished  his  picture  of  the  coming  battle,  as  a 
privilege  to  be  jealously  guarded  like  a  vested  interest,  the  same 
Westmoreland  wishes  that  the  King  and  he  could  fight  the  battle 
all  by  themselves  ;  with  laughing  arithmetical  confusion  Henry  says 
he  has  unwished  five  thousand  men. 

At  this  point  the  arrival  of  the  herald  brings  the  spirit  of  the 
enemy  as  a  foil  to  the  heroism  of  Henry .^  The  tone  of  the  French 
army  has  throughout  been  the  pride  that  goes  before  a  fall.  They 
are  sorry  that  the  English  numbers  are  so  few,  that  there  is  not 
work  enough  for  all  hands ;  the  superfluous  lackeys  of  their  host, 
they  declare,  are  enough  to  purge  the  field  of  such  a  hilding  foe. 

For  our  losses,  his  exchequer  is  too  poor ;  for  the  effusion  of 
our  blood,  the  muster  of  his  kingdom  too  faint  a  number ;  and 
for  our  disgrace,  his  own  person,  kneeling  at  our  feet,  but  a 
weak  and  worthless  satisfaction. ^ 

What  the  herald  who  brings  messages  like  this  has  to  encounter  is 
a  patient  dignity  flavoured  with  humour. 

Henry.  Bid  them  achieve  me  and  then  sell  my  bones. 

Good  God!  why  should  they  mock  poor  fellows  thus? 

The  man  that  once  did  sell  the  lion's  skin 

While  the  beast  lived,  was  kill'd  with  hunting  him. 

1  Henry  the  Fifth  :  IV.  i.  309.  2  iv.  iii.  79.  «  III.  vi.  140. 


30  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  brag  of  superior  numbers  is  at  best  a  poor  thing :  there  is 
something  heroic  in  the  braggartism  of  desperation. 

We  are  but  warriors  for  the  working-day ; 
Our  gayness  and  our  gilt  are  all  besmirch'd 
With  rainy  marching  in  the  painful  field ; 
There's  not  a  piece  of  feather  in  our  host  — 
Good  argument,  I  hope,  we  will  not  fly  — 
And  time  hath  worn  us  into  slovenry : 
But,  by  the  mass,  our  hearts  are  in  the  trim ; 
And  my  poor  soldiers  tell  me,  yet  ere  night 
They'll  be  in  fresher  robes,  or  they  will  pluck 
The  gay  new  coats  o'er  the  French  soldiers'  heads 
And  turn  them  out  of  service. 

From  inspection  of  host  and  reception  of  herald  we  glide  insen- 
sibly into  the  scenes  of  the  battle ;  but,  whatever  phase  of  war  may 
be  uppermost,  Henry  is  the  soul  of  it  all.  Now  he  is  weeping 
over  the  story  of  York  and  Suffolk,  how  they  kissed  one  another's 
gashes,  as  they  died  together,  first  fruits  of  the  slaughter ;  now  he  is 
loudly  proclaiming  his  Welsh  birth  to  humour  the  valiant  Fluellen ; 
now  he  is  holding  back  the  rejoicings  of  his  soldiers  until  victory  is 
more  decisive.^  He  responds  without  a  moment's  hesitation  to  the 
most  terrible  demands  that  the  accursed  business  of  war  can  make  : 
once,  when  he  orders  retaHation^  for  the  slaughter  of  non-comba- 
tants ;  once,  when  the  weakness  of  inferior  numbers  obliges  him  to 
threaten  —  happily,  only  to  threaten  —  slaughter  of  prisoners  in 
order  to  dislodge  a  band  of  the  enemy  from  an  inaccessible  posi- 
tion.^ With  the  rising  spirits  of  unmistakable  victory  the  army 
becomes  as  skittish  as  a  mob  of  schoolboys :  Henry  gives  vent  to 

1  Henry  the  Fifth  :  IV.  vi,  etc. 

2  So  I  understand  the  order  at  the  end  of  IV.  vi.  French  reinforcements,  instead 
of  meeting  the  English,  have  joined  the  fugitives,  and  the  two  together  have  fallen 
upon  the  non-combatants  of  the  English  camp.  So  the  incident  is  understood  by 
Fluellen  (IV.  vii.  i-io) :  this  great  stickler  for  principle  in  martial  law  entirely  ap- 
proves Henry's  action.  This  explanation  is  also  favoured  by  concluding  lines  of 
IV.  iv. 

s  IV.  vii.  58. 


HEROISM  AND   MORAL  BALANCE  31 

the  feeling  in  his  practical  joke  of  handing  his  gage  to  the  uncon- 
scious Fluellen  to  redeem,  and  getting  his  pomposity  a  box  on  the 
ears  from  honest  Bates,  care  being  taken  that  no  untoward  conse- 
quences shall  follow.*  In  the  midst  of  hilarity  comes  the  French 
herald,  and  the  first  precise  news  of  the  day's  fortune :  as  the  ter- 
rible slaughter  of  the  enemy  and  the  small  Enghsh  loss  are  made 
known,  high  spirits  give  place  to  solemn  awe :  — 

O  God,  thy  arm  was  here ! 

Henry  proclaims  it  death  to  boast  of  this  victory,  or  to  take  from 
God  the  praise  that  is  his  only. 

It  remains  for  the  fifth  act  to  display  yet  another  side  of  Henry's 
character;  as  action  was  at  the  commencement  of  the  play  balanced 
by  council,  so  at  its  close  war  becomes  a  foil  to  love.  The  scene 
of  wooing  in  broken  English  and  broken  French  has  always  been 
a  popular  favourite.  One  of  its  chief  charms  is  that  it  brings  out 
the  tact  of  the  hero.  Katherine  is  unmistakably  the  prize  of  war  : 
Henry,  who  has  been  exalted  by  the  bishops  as  commanding  every 
kind  of  eloquence,  chooses  to  woo  her  with  the  bluntness  of  the 
soldier,  veiling  tenderness  under  rough  simplicity. 

If  I  could  win  a  lady  at  leap-frog,  or  by  vaulting  into  my  sad- 
dle with  my  armour  on  my  back,  under  the  correction  of  brag- 
ging be  it  spoken,  I  should  quickly  leap  into  a  wife.  .  .  . 
And,  while  thou  livest,  dear  Kate,  take  a  fellow  of  plain  and 
uncoined  constancy ;  for  he  perforce  must  do  thee  right,  be- 
cause he  hath  not  the  gift  to  woo  in  other  places :  for  these 
fellows  of  infinite  tongue,  that  can  rhyme  themselves  into 
ladies'  favours,  they  do  always  reason  themselves  out  again. 
...  A  good  leg  will  fall ;  a  straight  back  will  stoop-;  a  black 
beard  will  turn  white  ;  a  curled  pate  will  grow  bald  ;  a  fair  face 
will  wither ;  a  full  eye  will  wax  hollow  :  but  a  good  heart,  Kate, 
is  the  sun  and  the  moon;  or  rather  the  sun,  and  not  the 
moon ;  for  it  shines  bright  and  never  changes,  but  keeps  his 
course  truly.  If  thou  would  have  such  a  one,  take  me;  and 
take  me,  take  a  soldier ;  take  a  soldier,  take  a  King. 

1  IV.  vii.  178,  and  whole  scene. 


32  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  effect  of  the  whole  scene  is  that,  at  the  close  of  the  story, 
conquest  presents  itself  as  a  marriage  of  those  two  countries  — 

.  .  .  whose  very  shores  look  pale 
With  envy  of  each  other's  happiness. 

It  was  with  something  like  a  flourish  of  the  dramatic  trumpet 
that  we  saw  ushered  in  the  protagonist  of  the  Shakespearean  stage. 
The  heroism  of  character  that  has  been  thus  presented  has  been 
found  to  consist,  not  in  the  grand  passion  of  a  Hotspur,  plucking 
honour  from  heights  and  depths  ;  nor  in  the  unparalleled  achieve- 
ments of  mediaeval  romance ;  nor  in  the  infinite  patience  of  the 
lives  of  the  saints.  Its  foundation  seems  to  be  breadth  of  human 
nature,  with  freshness  to  expand  the  horizon  when  responsibihty 
is  not  calHng  for  action.  Its  chief  note  is  a  moral  balance,  that 
will  not  allow  action  to  overpower  council,  nor  the  spirit  of  war  to 
ecHpse  the  spirit  of  peace ;  that  is  responsive  alike  to  dignity  and 
to  humour,  to  pathos  and  to  fun.  It  is  the  heroism  of  the  full 
soul,  not  consciously  ambitious  even  of  moral  greatness,  yet 
adequate  to  every  demand. 


II 

WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION:    THE  SECOND    FOUR   HISTORIES 

The  Shakespearean  Drama  contains  a  series  of  eight  consecu- 
tive plays  presenting  EngHsh  history ;  the  series  divides  into  two 
tetralogies,  between  which  there  is  one  curious  parallel.  Three 
plays  of  the  first  tetralogy,  as  we  have  seen,  cover  the  developing 
period  of  a  nature  that,  in  the  fourth  play,  rises  to  supreme  hero- 
ism. Similarly,  in  the  second  tetralogy,  the  triple  play  of  Henry 
the  Sixth  gives  us  successive  stages  of  an  advance  towards  an 
individuality  which  is  presented,  in  the  play  that  follows,  as  ideal 
villany. 

The  parallel  must  however  not  be  pressed ;  for,  whatever  may 
be  the  precise  facts  as  to  the  authorship  of  the  three  parts  of 
Henry  the  Sixth,  it  is  felt  by  many  readers  that  they  do  not  make  a 
continuous  and  consistent  scheme  like  that  of  the  other  trilogy. 
The  contents  of  the  plays  are  crude  history,  with  elementary  pas- 
sions and  melodramatic  incident :  for  the  most  part  scenes  of 
factious  turbulence,  and  civil  wars  in  which  father  kills  son,  and 
son  father.  The  heroes  are  such  as  butcher  Clifford,  thundering 
blood  and  death ;  or  his  son,  in  cruelty  seeking  out  his  fame ;  or 
wind-changing  Warwick,  setter  up  and  setter  down  of  kings ;  or  the 
"  tiger's  heart  wrapp'd  in  a  woman's  hide  "  of  Margaret,  antipodal 
to  all  that  is  good.  Amongst  these  are  plunged  from  their  earhest 
youth  the  "  forward  sons  of  York  "  :  Richard  is  the  most  forward 
of  them  all.^  There  is  that  which  marks  him  off  from  all  the  rest 
of  his  handsome  family.  He  is  a  "  valiant  crook-back  prodigy," 
a  "  heap  of  wrath,  foul  indigested  lump  "  ^ ;  the  language  is  the 

1  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  I.  i.  203. 

2  //  Henry  the  Sixth :  V.  i.  157 ;  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  1.  iv.  75 ;  etc. 

D  33 


34  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

bitter  satire  of  enemies,  but  Richard's  own  soliloquies  ^  are  enough 
to  show  that  his  physique  is  either  an  outward  symbol  of  a  dis- 
torted soul,  or  else  an  accident  that  contributes  its  share  to  the 
prince's  predisposition  towards  evil.  In  the  earlier  pictures  of 
Richard  we  can  see,  with  much  that  is  merely  boyish,  suggestions 
of  the  strength  and  the  moral  distortion  that  are  to  combine  later 
into  consummate  villany.  In  warlike  deeds  he  is  early  pronounced 
by  his  father  to  have  deserved  best  of  the  sons.^  In  council  we 
have  him  struggling  to  be  beforehand  with  his  elders,  and  he 
leaves  them  far  behind  in  audacity  of  moral  perversion. 

York.         I  took  an  oath  that  he  should  quietly  reign.  ^ 

Edward.    But  for  a  kingdom  any  oath  may  be  broken : 

I  would  break  a  thousand  oaths  to  reign  one  year. 

Richard.    No ;  God  forbid  your  grace  should  be  forsworn. 

York.         I  shall  be,  if  I  claim  by  open  war. 

Richard.    I'll  prove  the  contrary,  if  you'll  hear  me  speak. 

York.         Thou  canst  not,  son  ;  it  is  impossible. 

Richard.    An  oath  is  of  no  moment,  being  not  took 
Before  a  true  and  lawful  magistrate. 
That  hath  authority  over  him  that  swears  : 
Henry  had  none,  but  did  usurp  the  place ; 
Then,  seeing  'twas  he  that  made  you  to  depose, 
Your  oath,  my  lord,  is  vain  and  frivolous.^ 

It  is  just  here  that  we  get  our  first  glimpse  of  the  master  passion 
beneath  this  boy's  vigorous  personaUty. 

And,  father,  do  but  think 
How  sweet  a  thing  it  is  to  wear  a  crown ; 
Within  whose  circuit  is  Elysium 
And  all  that  poets  feign  of  bliss  and  joy. 

Richard  is  dominated  by  ambition ;  but  at  present  it  is  within  the 
bounds  of  vehement  partisanship,  sympathy  with  the  ambition  of 
his  father.     And  in  the  earlier  scenes  Richard  seems  not  devoid 

"^  III  Henry  the  Sixth :  III.  ii.  153;  V.  vi.  70;  Richard  the  Third:  I.  i.  14;  etc. 
2  ///  Henry  the  Sixth :  I.  i.  17.  »  ///  Henry  the  Sixth :  I.  ii.  15. 


WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION  35 

of  natural  feelings ;  though  side  by  side  with  these  are  also  sug- 
gestions of  what  will  be  the  demonic  levity  of  the  fully  developed 
villain.  He  has  freshness  of  soul  enough  to  become  enthusiastic 
about  a  brilliant  sunrise  ;  ^  but  when  the  natural  sun  turns  into  the 
miraculous  omen  of  three  suns,  and  his  elder  brother  exclaims  — 

Whate'er  it  bodes,  henceforward  I  will  bear 
Upon  my  target  three  fair-shining  suns  — 

Richard  instantly  comes  out  with  a  pun  at  Edward's  expense  — 

Nay,  bear  three  daughters :  by  your  leave  I  speak  it, 
You  love  the  breeder  better  than  the  male. 

There  is  room  for  bitter  taunts  as  the  brothers  stand  over  the 
fallen  body  of  their  father's  torturer  and  their  brother's  murderer, 
but  with  Richard  the  taunt  can  become  a  gibe  : 

What,  not  an  oath  ?  nay,  then  the  world  goes  hard 
When  Clifford  cannot  spare  his  friends  an  oath.^ 

Richard  seems  to  be  sincere  —  though  we  cannot  be  sure  —  in  his 
hero-worship  of  Warwick  and  Northumberland,^  and  when  he 
deems  it  prize  enough  to  be  his  valiant  father's  son.'*  Nay,  there 
even  seems  to  be  a  point  at  which  he  is  open  to  the  touch  of 
popular  superstition,  and  in  the  moment  of  being  ennobled  shrinks 
from  the  '  ominous '  dukedom  of  Gloucester.* 

The  turning-point  in  the  movement  of  the  third  play  is  found 
where  King  Edward  succumbs  to  the  charms  of  Lady  Grey,  and 
by  a  mesalliance  alienates  his  strong  supporters,  and  causes  the 
current  of  events  to  flow  backward.  This  is  a  turning-point  also 
for  Richard  :  a  long  soliloquy®  reveals  the  changing  character,  the 
constituent  elements  precipitating  into  a  unity  of  unscrupulous 
ambition.     The  new  suggestion  of  royal  offspring  brings  out,  with 

1  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  i,  from  25.        ■*  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  i.  20. 

2  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  vi,  from  31.      5  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  vi.  107. 

8  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  i.  148,  186.       6  ///  Henry  the  Sixth :  III.  ii,  from  124. 


36  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

a  shock,  the  personal  hopes  that  had  been  silently  forming  in  the 
breast  of  the  remoter  heir. 

Would  he  were  wasted,  marrow,  bones  and  all, 
That  from  his  loins  no  hopeful  branch  may  spring. 
To  cross  me  from  the  golden  time  I  look  for  ! 

This  thought  yields  to  the  natural  reflection  on  the  number  of 
personages  who  already  —  without  waiting  for  possibilities  —  stand 
between  Richard  and  his  soul's  desire;  until  sovereignty  seems 
but  a  dream : 

Like  one  that  stands  upon  a  promontory 

And  spies  a  far-off  shore  where  he  would  tread, 

Wishing  his  foot  were  equal  with  his  eye. 

And  chides  the  sea  that  sunders  him  from  thence. 

With  empty  impatience  he  says  to  himself  in  reference  to  these 
obstacles  to  his  rise  — 

I'll  cut  the  causes  off. 
Flattering  me  with  impossibilities. 

He  turns  to  other  alternatives :  but  the  bitter  thought  of  his 
deformity  comes  to  check  aspirations  after  a  life  of  pleasure. 

I'll  make  my  heaven  to  dream  upon  the  crown. 
And,  while  I  live,  to  account  this  world  but  hell, 
Until  my  mis-shaped  trunk  that  bears  this  head 
Be  round  impaled  with  a  glorious  crown. 

But  again  Richard  is  plunged  in  despair  at  the  many  lives  that 
"stand  between  me  and  home."  He  struggles  out  of  the  tor- 
menting perplexity  by  a  review  of  his  resources  —  resources  of  his 
own  personal  qualities  :  the  passage  may  perhaps,  in  our  contrast, 
stand  as  counterpart  to  the  bishops'  laudation  of  the  universal 
powers  of  Henry  the  Fifth. 

Why,  I  can  smile,  and  murder  whiles  I  smile, 
And  cry  *  Content '  to  that  which  grieves  my  heart, 
And  wet  my  cheeks  with  artificial  tears. 
And  frame  my  face  to  all  occasions. 


WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION  37 

ril  drown  more  sailors  than  the  mermaid  shall ; 
I'll  slay  more  gazers  than  the  basilisk ; 
I'll  play  the  orator  as  well  as  Nestor, 
Deceive  more  slily  than  Ulysses  could, 
And  like  a  Sinon  take  another  Troy. 
I  can  add  colours  to  the  chameleon, 
Change  shapes  with  Proteus  for  advantages, 
And  set  the  murderous  Machiavel  to  school. 
Can  I  do  this,  and  cannot  get  a  crown  ? 

Here  then  a  clear  stage  in  his  development  has  been  completely 
attained  by  Richard :  he  is  a  man  of  one  idea  and  one  ambition, 
consciously  emancipated  from  all  moral  scruples. 

In  the  latter  half  of  the  play,  if  there  is  a  note  of  ambiguity  in 
Richard's  action,  it  is  the  ambiguity  of  the  part  he  has  set  him- 
self to  play :  he  is  hostile  to  the  King,  faithful  to  the  crown,  with 
the  faithfulness  of  the  butcher  to  the  sheep  he  means  to  eat. 
Richard  seconds,  or  even  leads,  in  the  discontent  at  the  royal 
marriage,  until  Clarence  has  reached  the  point  of  threatening 
open  rupture,  when  Richard  draws  back : 

I  hear,  yet  say  not  much,  but  think  the  more.^ 

The  fruit  of  this  ill-fated  marriage  becomes  manifest  in  the  revolt 
of  Warwick,  Clarence  deserting  to  him.  Richard  remains  with 
the  King,  "not  for  the  love  of  Edward,  but  the  crown." ^  In  the 
rapidly  changing  events  that  succeed,  Richard  is  the  follower  who 
pushes  his  leader  forward  from  point  to  point.  In  the  tragedy 
of  young  Prince  Edward's  assassination^  Richard  has  no  greater 
share  than  his  brothers ;  the  difference  is  that  these  brothers  have 
exhausted  their  souls  by  this  horror,  Richard  has  but  whetted  his 
appetite. 

Q.  Margaret.     O,  kill  me  too ! 

Gloucester.  Marry,  and  shall.     {Offers  to  kill  her. 

Held  back  by  main  force  from  this  atrocity,  the  resources  of 
Gloucester  have  found  him  another. 

1  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  IV.  i.  83.  2  i y,  i.  126.  «  V.  v. 


38  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

Gloucester.     Clarence,  excuse  me  to  the  king  my  brother ; 
ril  hence  to  London  on  a  serious  matter. 

They  all  understand,  but  none  dares  follow  to  the  assassination 
of  a  king. 

We  thus  reach  the  crowning  incident  of  the  trilogy,  as  it  were 
the  graduating  exercise  of  Richard's  education  in  villany.  He 
has  long  been  a  man  of  one  ambition ;  but,  so  far  as  the  path 
of  his  ambition  is  concerned,  the  single  quick  stab  in  which  Rich- 
ard has  had  so  much  practice  would  be  all  that  is  required. 
Wherefore  then  the  long  protracted  scene  ?^  The  peaceful  Henry 
is  no  bad  reader  of  men,  and  he  catches  exactly  the  spirit  of  the 
incident  with  his  question  — 

What  scene  of  death  hath  Roscius  now  to  act  ? 
There  is  now  artistic  appreciation  of  the  villany,  as  well  as  ambi- 
tious purpose  to  indicate  the  crime.  With  Mephistophelean  re- 
straint of  passion  the  murderer  gravely  mocks  his  victim  from 
point  to  point ;  when  the  helpless  Henry  in  his  outpouring  has 
passed  from  bitter  taunts  and  descriptions  of  hideous  deformity  to 
enumeration  of  the  evils  the  monster  is  ordained  to  bring  on  his 
country,  the  point  has  been  reached  for  the  dramatic  coup  : 

Gloucester.     Fll  hear  no  more :  die,  prophet,  in  thy  speech  :     [Stabs 
htm. 
For  this,  amongst  the  rest,  was  I  ordain'd. 

Richard  mocks  the  aspiring  blood  of  Lancaster  sinking  into  the 
earth,  and  then  with  a  superfluous  stab  starts  a  summary  of  the 
whole  situation. 

Down,  down  to  hell ;  and  say  I  sent  thee  thither  : 

I,  that  have  neither  pity,  love,  nor  fear. 

Indeed,  'tis  true  that  Henry  told  me  of; 

For  I  have  often  heard  my  mother  say 

I  came  into  the  world  with  my  legs  forward : 

Had  I  not  reason,  think  ye,  to  make  haste. 

And  seek  their  ruin  that  usurpM  our  right  } 

1  ///  Henry  the  Sixth  :  V.  vi. 


WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION  39 

The  midwife  wonder'd  and  the  women  cried 

*  O,  Jesus  bless  us,  he  is  born  with  teeth ! ' 

And  so  I  was  :  which  plainly  signified 

That  I  should  snarl  and  bite  and  play  the  dog. 

Then,  since  the  heavens  have  shaped  my  body  so, 

Let  hell  make  crook'd  my  mind  to  answer  it. 

I  have  no  brother,  I  am  like  no  brother ; 

And  this  word  '  love,'  which  greybeards  call  divine, 

Be  resident  in  men  like  one  another 

And  not  in  me  :  I  am  myself  alone. 

It  is  natural  to  place  this  soliloquy  side  by  side  with  that  of  the 
third  act.  In  the  one,  Richard  devoted  himself  to  ambition,  at 
whatever  cost  of  villanous  action;  in  the  other,  the  villany  is 
embraced.  In  the  third  act  there  was  enumeration,  in  the  nature 
of  a  claim,  of  qualities  suitable  to  evil  deeds ;  in  the  fifth  act  the 
claim  has  been  vouched  for  by  the  dripping  sword  and  murdered 
King.  In  the  third  act  Richard  aspired :  in  the  fifth  act  Richard 
has  attained. 

We  pass  to  the  play  which  takes  its  name  from  Richard,^  and 
almost  the  first  words  we  hear  are  these  : 

I  am  determined  to  prove  a  villain. 

As  the  opening  of  Henry  the  Fifth  presented  what  seemed  to 
outside  observers  a  sudden  conversion,  so  these  words  mark  the 
end  of  development,  and  announce  a  character  complete  in  its 
kind.  What  exactly  is  the  process  that  has  been  thus  com- 
pleted? It  is  the  common  phenomenon  of  human  nature  by 
which  things  that  have  been  means  to  an  end  come  in  time  to 
be  an  end  in  themselves.  A  man  takes  up  a  laborious  business, 
with  the  distinct  motive  of  providing  a  competence  or  even  means 
of  luxury ;  as  the  years  go  on,  the  business  itself  and  the  attraction 
of  wealth-making  become   uppermost;    worth   his  millions,  the 

1  The  play  of  Richard  the  Third  as  a  study  of  retribution  has  been  worked  out 
at  length  in  Chapters  IV,  V  of  my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist.  See  above, 
page  V. 


40  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

man  continues  to  labour;  he  enjoys  of  course  such  luxuries  as 
his  means  afford,  but  the  business,  not  the  luxury,  has  become 
the  motive.  So  Richard  began  with  the  commonplace  motive  of 
ambition,  learning  for  the  sake  of  his  ambition  to  do  evil  deeds ; 
by  the  end  of  the  trilogy  the  evil  itself  has  come  to  be  the  attrac- 
tion; he  continues  of  course  to  remove  obstacles  barring  him 
from  the  crown,  and  to  defend  it  when  won,  but  evil  itself,  not 
ambition,  has  become  the  master  passion.  The  new  play  gives 
us  ideal  villany  in  the  sense  that  villany  has  itself  become  the 
ideal.  Richard  has  become  an  artist  in  evil :  the  natural  emo- 
tions attending  crime  —  whether  of  passionate  longing,  or  horror 
and  remorse  —  have  given  place  to  artistic  appreciation  of  master- 
pieces. And  another  element  of  the  ideal  is  added  :  that  of 
success.  The  cumulative  effect  of  successive  victories  surrounds 
the  hero  with  an  air  of  irresistibility  that  makes  him  even  more 
irresistible. 

A  moral  system,  we  have  seen,  involves  the  association  of 
character  with  fate ;  when  our  conception  of  character  is  com- 
plete we  naturally  ask.  What  sort  of  fate  is  there  meted  out  in 
this  play?  Our  first  thought  is  of  retribution.  Retribution  is  a 
fundamental  idea  in  morals.  It  amounts  almost  to  an  instinct : 
the  smallest  child  feels  a  virtuous  impulse  to  slap  the  table  against 
which  it  has  stumbled.  And  in  traditional  philosophy  wise  men 
have  sought  to  make  the  whole  moral  government  of  the  universe 
synonymous  with  the  judgment  on  the  sinner.  In  the  case  before 
us  many  readers  of  Shakespeare  feel  that  the  play  is  defective  in 
this  very  point.  The  fate  of  Richard  is  very  much  like  the  fate 
of  other  men  :  where  is  there  any  retribution  commensurate  with 
the  ideal  picture  of  wrong  ? 

Such  a  feeling  seems  to  betray  a  mistaken  way  of  looking  at 
things,  the  mistake  being  equally  one  of  morals  and  of  dramatic 
interpretation.  In  real  life  such  a  feeling  has  led,  in  past  ages, 
to  the  institution  of  judicial  torture.  Human  life  is  so  precious 
(such  has  been  the  unconscious  argument)  that  one  who  simply 
murders  another  deserves  death ;  what  then  is  to  be  done  in  the 


WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION  4 1 

case  where  to  murder  is  added  long  contriving  malice,  with  aggra- 
vations of  cruel  detail,  or  violations  of  gratitude  and  ties  of  kin- 
ship? Hence  human  justice  has  devised  the  stake  and  the 
apparatus  of  torture,  and  outraged  loyalty  has  demanded  that 
the  slayer  of  a  Coeur-de-Lion  shall  be  flayed  alive.  Modern 
enlightenment  has  discarded  all  such  devices ;  it  has  learned  to 
look  away  from  the  nice  weighing  of  individual  guilt  and  punish- 
ment to  the  field  of  morals  as  a  whole,  as  the  sphere  in  which 
principle  is  to  triumph.  Now  the  dramatic  equivalent  for  this 
"  field  of  morals  as  a  whole  "  is  plot.  Each  play  is  a  microcosm, 
and  the  providential  government  swaying  in  that  microcosm  is  to 
be  found  only  when  the  complexity  of  the  play  has  been  analysed 
into  a  unity  of  design.  It  is  the  failure  to  found  dramatic  inter- 
pretation upon  the  study  of  plot  that  has  led  to  dissatisfaction 
with  Shakespeare's  treatment  of  this  story.  When  the  play  has 
been  fully  analysed  it  will  appear  that,  in  this  case,  the  whole 
government  of  the  universe  is  placed  before  us  as  a  complex 
scheme,  of  which  the  single  underlying  principle  is  retribution. 
To  begin  with,  the  action  and  experience  which  make  up  the 
story  of  the  play  are  enveloped  in  the  wider  life  of  history,  which 
both  fringes  them  round  and  links  this  to  the  other  plays  of  the 
series.  The  history  is  the  Wars  of  the  Roses :  and  this  history 
is  presented  by  Shakespeare  as  retributive  history.  In  the  heart 
of  the  drama  Margaret's  curses  emphasise  the  thought  that  what 
the  various  personages  of  this  Yorkist  story  are  suffering  at  one 
another's  hands  is  retribution  upon  the  whole  house  of  York  for 
their  earlier  cruelty  to  Lancastrians ;  Richard's  retort  upon  Mar- 
garet is  a  reminder  that  such  cruelty  to  Lancastrians  was  itself 
nemesis  upon  them  for  still  earlier  outrages  upon  Yorkists.^  Thus 
history  is  made  to  take  the  form  of  the  pendulum  swing  of  retri- 
bution between  one  and  the  other  of  the  sinful  factions.  Again, 
a  similar  spirit  is  read  into  the  experience  of  the  crowd  of  inferior 
personages  who  make  the  underplot  of  the  play.  Naturalists  love 
to  dwell  upon  the  chain  of  destruction  that  binds  together  the 

1  Richard  the  Third:  I.  iii.  174,  and  whole  scene. 


42  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

grades  of  animal  life :  tiny  humming-bird  seized  by  tarantula, 
tarantula  gripped  by  lizard,  lizard  made  victim  of  snake,  snake 
pounced  upon  by  hawk,  hawk  yielding  to  eagle,  which  in  turn  is 
brought  down  by  the  human  rifle.  A  similar  chain  of  retribution 
is  being  forged  when  Clarence,  deserter  to  the  Yorkist  house, 
meets  his  death  at  the  hands  of  the  Yorkist  King,  and  gives  a 
triumph  to  the  Queen's  kindred ;  the  Queen's  kindred,  through 
the  shock  of  Clarence's  death,  lose  the  King,  their  only  protector, 
and  suffer  the  taunting  gibes  of  Hastings;  Hastings,  visited  by 
an  exactly  similar  doom,  is  laughed  at  by  Buckingham  in  his 
security ;  the  secure  Buckingham  is  cast  off  by  a  doom  as  taunt- 
ing as  that  of  Hastings.^  These  repeated  strokes  of  doom,  more- 
over, are  not  merely  sentences  of  death  :  in  each  single  case  there 
is  a  sudden  recognition  of  the  forgotten  principles  of  justice,  or 
an  appreciation  of  some  bitter  irony  :  ^  fate  seems  to  move  forward 
with  the  rhythmic  march  of  nemesis.  Thus,  apart  even  from  the 
case  of  Richard  himself,  the  plot  of  the  play  is  an  intricate  net- 
work of  retribution  in  its  varied  aspects — a  pendulum  of  nemesis, 
a  chain  of  retribution,  a  rhythm  of  retributive  justice. 

When  our  analysis  enlarges  to  take  in  Richard,  he  is  at  once 
recognised  as  the  motive  force  of  the  play :  all  these  multiplied 
retributions  are,  directly  or  indirectly,  forwarded  in  their  course 
by  the  agency  of  the  hero.  Unconsciously  to  himself,  this 
Richard,  whose  villany  has  been  such  an  outrage  upon  our  sense 
of  justice,  has  been  chief  factor  in  a  scheme  of  retribution.  In 
the  language  of  ancient  prophecy,  he  is  the  Hammer  of  God : 
brute  force  suffered  to  continue  as  a  purifier  of  evil,  until  its  work 
is  done,  and  it  can  itself  be  purified  out  of  the  world. 

But  what  of  Richard  when  he  changes  from  the  agent  to  the 
victim  of  nemesis?  It  might  have  been  so  ordered  that  the  earth 
should  open  its  mouth  and  swallow  up  the  monster  :  in  which  case 

^  Compare  in /Richard  iA€  Third:  II.  i.  131;  II.  ii.  62;  III.  iv.  15-95;  III.  i, 
from  157;  III.  ii.  114;  IV.  ii;  V.  i. 

^  E.g.  I.  iv.  66;  III.  iii.  15;  and  especially  V.  i.  10-22.  Compare  generally  my 
Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist,  pages  114-8. 


WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION  43 

there  would  have  been  a  moment's  pang,  and  all  would  have  been 
over.  Or  the  resourceful  brain  of  a  sensational  novelist  might 
have  contrived  some  exquisite  bodily  torment  to  clutch  Richard 
in  its  fangs  :  and  then  the  reader,  in  spite  of  himself,  would  have 
felt  the  gates  of  his  sympathy  opening,  and  the  hunchback  villain 
might  have  come  out  a  hero,  such  as  Shylock  in  his  misfortunes 
is  to  many  readers  of  The  Merchant  of  Venice.  Shakespeare's 
treatment  of  the  present  case  is  very  different.  Richard  is  an 
artist  in  evil,  who  plays  with  human  life  :  accordingly  Destiny 
plays  with  Richard.  Fate  hides  itself,  until — long  past  the  centre 
of  the  poem  —  the  crowned  villain  has  attained  an  impregnable 
sense  of  security ;  then  comes  the  first  sign  of  change,  and  the 
name  of  Richmond  has  only  to  be  mentioned  for  memories  to 
flash  upon  Richard,  how  the  destined  avenger  has  been  the  theme 
of  prophecies  which  the  victim  never  realised  till  too  late.^  From 
this  point  the  play  becomes  a  series  of  alternating  rumours, 
rumours  of  success  as  well  as  failure,  in  order  that  hope  may 
quicken  sensitiveness  to  despair.  Gradually  the  King  is  driven 
from  his  magnificent  imperturbability ;  he  loses  temper,  he  makes 
mistakes,  he  casts  about  for  devices,  he  changes  his  mind,  he 
feverishly  takes  refuge  in  drink :  in  a  word,  he  consciously  re- 
cognises the  stages  of  his  descent  to  the  commonplace.^  And 
all  this  is  but  dramatic  preparation,  leading  up  to  the  climax  of 
retribution. 

This,  climax  is  of  course  the  Night  Scene.^  Its  force  rests  upon 
the  moral  principle  underlying  the  career  of  Richard  :  it  is  an 
assertion  of  individual  will  against  the  order  of  the  universe.  All 
ordinary  restraints  upon  individual  will  —  sympathy,  inherited 
affections,  remorse — Richard  has  learned  to  cast  off:  his  position 
seems  impregnable.  But  he  has  forgotten  that  there  are  condi- 
tions under  which  the  will  is  unable  to  act ;  and  these  are  found, 
not  in  some  remote  combination  of  unlikely  circumstances,  but 

1  IV.  ii.  88-122. 

2  Compare  such  passages  as  IV.  iv.  444-56 ;  509-18 ;  V.  iii.  1-8 ;  47-70. 
8  V.  iii,  from  n8.    Compare  also  IV.  i.  85. 


44  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

in  the  most  commonplace  of  everyday  conditions  —  sleep.  All 
other  powers  may  be  in  full  activity  when  we  slumber :  the  will  is 
entirely  paralysed.  Hence  when  Richard,  in  the  weariness  of  the 
night  before  the  battle,  drops  asleep,  he  is  held  as  in  a  vice  by 
Destiny,  while  outraged  humanity  asserts  itself.  In  his  helpless- 
ness he  must  see  the  rhythmic  procession  of  his  victims,  counting 
up  the  crimes  that  are  to  be  remembered  in  the  morrow's  doom ; 
still  helpless,  he  must  watch  the  ghostlike  figures  pass  over  to  the 
opposite  camp,  foreshadowing  the  desertion  to  the  foe,  whom  they 
bless  as  the  coming  victor.  If  the  sleeping  powers  turn  from 
passive  to  active,  it  is  but  to  take  part  against  the  helpless  sleeper 
in  the  play  of  Destiny  upon  its  victim.  Now  he  is  fleeing  from 
the  battle  and  his  horse  has  failed  him ;  another  horse  secured, 
he  cannot  mount  for  the  streaming  of  his  open  wounds.^  Another 
quick  change  of  dream  movement,  and  all  around  is  shining  with 
the  livid  gleam  of  hell  fire,^  and  there  goes  up  a  groan — 

Have  mercy,  Jesu ! 

It  has  broken  the  spell :  but  there  is  still  to  be  traversed  the 
horrible  stage  of  the  gradual  awakening  from  nightmare,  and 
the  ghastly  dialogue  of  the  two  selves  is  heard  —  the  suppressed 
self  of  inherited  humanity,  and  the  artificial  callousness  so  pain- 
fully built  up.  In  time  his  will  recovers  control :  but  meanwhile 
Richard  himself  recognises  the  shattered  nerves  with  which  he  is 
to  meet  his  final  fall : 

By  the  apostle  Paul,  shadows  to-night 

Have  struck  more  terror  to  the  soul  of  Richard 

Than  can  the  substance  of  ten  thousand  soldiers.^ 

Thus  the  play  of  Richard  the  Third  exhibits,  in  its  most  pro- 
nounced form,  Shakespeare's  treatment  of  Wrong  and  Retribution. 
He  has  imagined  for  us  an  evil  nature,  set  off  to  the  eye  by  dis- 

1  V.  iii.  177. 

2  So  I  interpret  the  words  on  waking,  The  lights  burn  blue, 
8  V.  iii.  216. 


WRONG  AND   RETRIBUTION  45 

torted  shape,  arising  out  of  a  past  of  historic  turbulence,  attaining, 
in  the  present  play,  a  depth  of  moral  degeneration  in  which 
villany  is  accepted  as  an  ideal.  Such  ideal  villany  is  projected 
into  a  universe  which,  in  this  one  drama,  is  presented  as  a  com- 
plex providential  order  every  element  of  which  is  some  varied 
phase  of  retribution. 


Ill 

INNOCENCE  AND  PATHOS:    THE  TRAGEDY  OF 
ROMEO  AND  JULIET 

.  In  the  preceding  chapter  we  have  been  reviewing  a  drama  the 
plot  of  which  presents  the  universe  as  an  elaborate  system  of  retri- 
bution. In  turning  from  this  to  other  stories  we  are  not  to  expect 
that  in  these  the  same  aspect  of  the  universe  will  be  the  one 
emphasised.  I  beheve  that  no  mistake  has  done  more  to  distort 
Shakespeare  criticism  than  the  assumption  on  the  part  of  so  many 
commentators  that  retribution  is  an  invariable  principle.  Their 
favourite  maxims  are  that  the  deed  returns  upon  the  doer,  that  char- 
acter determines  fate.  But  these  specious  principles  need  careful 
examination.  If  the  meaning  be  merely  this,  that  the  deed  often 
returns  upon  the  doer,  that  character  is  one  of  the  forces  deter- 
mining fate,  then  these  are  profound  truths.  But  if,  as  is  usually 
the  case,  there  is  the  suggestion  that  such  maxims  embody  inva- 
riable laws  —  that  the  deed  always  returns  upon  the  doer,  that  char- 
acter and  nothing  but  character  determines  the  fate  of  individuals 
—  then  the  principles  are  false ;  false  alike  to  hfe  itself  and'  to  the 
V  reflection  of  life  in  poetry. 

To  take  a  crucial  illustration.  The  Cordelia  of  Shakespeare  is 
recognised  by  all  as  a  sweet  and  loving  woman  who  devotes  her- 
self to  save  her  father.  In  the  sequel  she  is  defeated,  imprisoned, 
and  cruelly  hanged.  Commentators  who  have  assumed  the  inva- 
riability of  nemesis  feel  bound  to  find  in  Cordelia's  character  some 
flaw  which  will  justify  such  an  ending  to  her  career.  They  suggest 
that,  however  noble  her  aim,  in  the  means  employed  she  has 
sinned  against  patriotism,  by  calling  in  the  French — natural  ene- 
mies of  England,  we  are  to  understand  —  to  rescue  Lear  from  his 

46 


INNOCENCE  AND   PATHOS  47 

evil  daughters  :  this  sin  against  patriotism  must  be  atoned  for  by 
suffering  and  ignominy.  I  am  persuaded  that  no  one  who  comes 
to  the  play  without  a  theory  to  support  will  so  read  the  course  of 
the  story.  There  is  not  a  single  detail  of  Shakespeare's  poem  to 
which  such  a  violation  of  patriotism  can  be  attached ;  those  in  the 
story  who  are  most  patriotic  are  on  Cordelia's  side,  and  even  Albany, 
whose  office  obliges  him  to  resist  the  French  invasion,  complains 
that  he  cannot  be  valiant  where  his  conscience  is  on  the  other 
side.^  Cordelia  no  more  sins  against  patriotism,  in  using  the 
French  army  to  resist  the  wicked  queens,  than  the  authors  of  the 
revolution  of  1688  were  unpatriotic,  when  they  called  in  William 
of  Orange  to  deliver  England  from  King  James.  How  then  is  the 
untoward  fate  of  Cordelia  to  be  explained  ?  The  plot  of  the  play 
at  this  point  is  dominated,  not  by  nemesis,  but  by  another  dramatic 
motive ;  it  is  not  satisfying  our  sense  of  retribution,  but  exhibiting 
the  pathos  that  unlocks  the  sympathy  of  the  spectator,  and  sheds 
a  beauty  over  suffering  itself.  Cordelia  has  devoted  herself  to  her 
father :  fate  mysteriously  seconds  her  devotion,  and  leaves  out 
nothing,  not  even  her  hfe,  to  make  the  sacrifice  complete. 

It  is  obvious  that  to  approach  dramas  with  some  antecedent 
assumption  as  to  principles  invariably  to  be  found  in  them  is  a  vio- 
lation of  the  inductive  criticism  attempted  in  this  work,  which 
frankly  accepts  the  details  of  a  poem  as  they  stand  m  order  to 
evolve  from  these  alone  the  underlying  principles.  But  1  would 
for  the  moment  waive  this  point  in  order  to  ask,  What  authority 
have  we  for  the  assumption  itself  that  retribution  is  an  invariable 
principle  of  providential  government?  In  the  drama  of  antiquity, 
as  all  will  concede,  no  such  principle  holds;  Greek  tragedy  is 
never  so  tragic  as  where  it  exhibits  the  good  man  crushed  by 
external  force  of  Destiny.  But  the  contention  is  often  made  that 
all  this  has  been  changed  by  modern  religion,  not  any  particular 
theological  system,  but  the  whole  spirit  of  modern  religion,  of 
which  the  Bible  is  the  embodiment ;  that  this  has  introduced  such 
conceptions  of  God  and  of  man  that  Shakespeare  and  other 
1  Lear:  V,  i.  23. 


48  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

modern  poets  cannot  give  us  a  sense  of  poetic  satisfaction  unless 
their  dramatic  world  presents  a  providence  wholly  of  retribution, 
under  which  men  face  no  power  determining  their  individual  fates 
other  than  the  destiny  they  have  made  by  their  individual  charac- 
ters. To  me  it  seems  extraordinary  that  any  such  contention 
should  have  been  put  forward  in  the  name  of  biblical  religion. 
Not  to  mention  other  objections,  such  a  plea  flies  in  the  face  of 
what,  from  the  literary  point  of  view,  is  the  most  impressive  por- 
tion of  the  Bible  itself — the  Book  of  Job,  Here  we  have  a  hero, 
whom  God  himself  accepts  as  perfect  and  upright,  overwhelmed 
by  waves  of  calamity  reducing  him  to  penury  and  excruciating  him 
with  disease.  Men  gather  together  to  discuss  the  strange  event. 
The  three  Friends  of  Job  take  up  exactly  the  position  I  am  here 
impugning  —  the  invariable  connection  of  suffering  with  sin,  so 
that  the  calamities  of  Job  are  proof  positive  of  some  unknown 
guilt.  Job  tears  their  argument  to  tatters ;  in  the  excitement  of 
debate  he  seems  to  recognise  the  impunity  of  the  sinner  as  a 
principle  of  providential  government  not  less  prominent  than  the 
principle  of  retribution.  Who  is  to  decide  between  these  opposite 
views  ?  In  the  epilogue  to  Job  God  is  represented  as  declaring 
that  the  three  Friends  have  not  said  the  thing  that  is  right,  as  Job 
has.  And  all  the  while  the  reader  of  the  Book  of  Job  has  known 
—  from  the  opening  story  —  that  the  calamities  were  sent  from 
heaven  upon  Job  for  reasons  connected  with  his  righteousness,  and 
not  with  his  sin.  Thus  the  biblical  Book  of  Job  is  the  strongest 
of  all  pronouncements  against  the  invariability  of  retribution,  the 
strongest  of  all  assertions  that,  besides  this,  other  principles  are 
recognised  in  the  providential  government  of  the  universe. 

The  attempt  to  analyse  all  experience  in  terms  of  retribution  is 
false  alike  to  real  life  and  to  life  in  the  ideal.  In  the  real  life  about 
us  a  little  child  dies  :  how  in  this  experience  has  character  deter- 
mined fate?  Not  the  character  of  the  child,  for  there  has  been 
no  responsibility.  There  may  be  cases  in  which  the  death  of  a 
child  is  retribution  upon  the  carelessness  or  folly  of  parents ;  but 
will  any  one  contend  that  this  is  always  so  ?    Yet  the  experience  is 


INNOCENCE  AND   PATHOS  49 

not  meaningless :  there  is  a  certain  beauty  as  we  contemplate  the 
child  life  consummated  in  its  own  simplicity,  before  the  weight  of 
coming  maturity  has  effaced  a  single  lineament  of  childhood's  own 
special  grace.  Nemesis  has  no  application,  but  there  is  room  for 
pathos. 

It  is  however  zeal  for  the  idealising  of  life  that  has  given  strength 
to  the  contention  that  in  poetry  at  all  events  character  alone  must 
determine  fate.  But,  in  the  spirit  of  the  Book  of  Job  ^  we  may  make 
bold  to  say  that  such  invariability  of  retribution  lowers  the  concep- 
tion of  human  life ;  the  world  becomes  not  less  but  more  ideal 
where  the  providential  system  of  government  gives  room  for  prin- 
ciples other  than  retributive.  Moral  elevation  imphes  moral  choice. 
But  if  the  connection  between  character  and  fate  were  immutable 
—  if  righteousness  necessarily  and  inevitably  brought  reward,  and 
guilt  necessarily  and  inevitably  ended  in  ruin  —  then  in  so  mechani- 
cal a  life  men  would  be  forever  choosing  between  prosperity  and 
adversity,  while  there  would  be  no  opportunity  for  the  higher  choice 
between  right  and  wrong.  In  Job,  the  Council  in  Heaven  recog- 
nises that  the  unbroken  prosperity  of  the  patriarch  has  made  it 
impossible  to  say  whether  his  life  is  a  life  of  true  piety  or  of  inter- 
ested policy ;  ^  it  is  only  when  unmerited  calamities  have  over- 
whelmed him  that  Job  can  reveal  his  higher  self  with  the  cry, 
"  Though  he  slay  me,  I  will  trust  him."  The  three  children  of  the 
Book  of  Daniel,  confronting  cruel  persecution,  believe  indeed  that 
their  God  can  deliver  them  from  the  tyrant ;  but  we  feel  them  as 
rising  to  a  higher  moral  plane  when  they  go  on  to  face  the  other 
alternative,  ^^  But  if  not,  we  will  not  bow  down."^  It  is  the  ex- 
ceptions to  the  universality  of  retribution  that  make  the  free  atmos- 
phere in  which  alone  the  highest  morality  can  develop. 

Whether  therefore  we  consider  real  life  or  life  in  the  ideal, 
whether  we  review  ancient  tragedy  or  the  literature  of  the  Bible, 
we  are  led  to  the  conclusion  that  a  moral  system  revealed  in 
dramatic  plot  must  be  expected  to  exhibit  nemesis  as  a  single 
aspect  of  providence,  and  not  as  its  sole  law.  Now  one  of  the 
1  Job  i.  9-10.  2  Daniel  iii.  17-18. 

E 


50  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

principles  underlying  the  exceptions  to  the  universality  of  retribu- 
tion, one  of  the  forces  that  will  be  found  to  come  between  individ- 
ual character  and  individual  fate,  is  that  which  is  expressed  by  the 
term  Accident.  I  know  that  to  many  of  my  readers  this  word  will 
be  a  stumblingblock ;  those  especially  who  are  new  to  ethical  studies 
are  apt  to  consider  that  their  philosophical  reputation  will  be  com- 
promised if  they  consent  to  recognise  the  possibility  of  accidents. 
But  such  a  feeling  rests  upon  a  confusion  between  physics  and 
morals.  In  the  physical  world,  which  is  founded  upon  universality 
and  the  sum  of  things,  we  make  it  a  preliminary  axiom  that  every 
event  has  a  cause,  known  or  yet  to  be  discovered.  But  in  the  world 
of  morals,  where  individual  responsibility  comes  in,  it  is  obvious  that 
events  must  happen  to  individuals  the  causes  of  which  are  outside 
individual  control.  To  take  the  simplest  example.  A  number  of 
persons,  in  the  ordinary  course  of  their  daily  life,  enter  a  railway 
train;  the  train  goes  over  an  embankment  into  a  river,  and  fifty 
of  the  occupants  meet  a  violent  and  painful  death.  We  call  this, 
rightly,  a  *  railway  accident.'  It  is  true  that,  so  far  as  the  incident 
is  a  part  of  the  physical  world,  there  have  been  ample  causes  for  all 
the  effects  :  there  has  been  careless  service,  or  undermining  waters, 
and  gravitation  has  done  its  proper  work.  But  in  the  moral  world 
of  each  individual  who  has  thus  perished  there  has  been  no  causa- 
tion ;  nothing  these  persons  have  done  has  caused  the  disaster, 
nothing  left  undone  by  them  would  have  averted  it;  in  the  uni- 
verse of  their  individual  lives  the  incident  remains  an  effect  without 
a  cause.  A  deed  has  here  returned  upon  others  than  the  doer ; 
whatever  we  may  call  it  in  physics,  the  event  must  be  pronounced 
a  moral  accident. 

I^The  moral  system  of  Shakespeare  gives  full  recognition  to  acci- 
dent  as  well  as  retribution ;  the  interest  of  plot  at  one  point  is  the 
moral  satisfaction  of  nemesis,  where  we  watch  the  sinner  found 
out  by  his  sin ;  it  changes  at  another  point  to  the  not  less  moral 
sensation  of  pathos,  our  sympathy  going  out  to  the  suffering  which 
is  independent  of  wrong  doing.  A  notable  illustration  of  the  lat- 
ter is  the  tragedy  of  Romeo  and  Juliet.  .,  In  this  play  Shakespeare 


INNOCENCE  AND  PATHOS  5 1 

engages  our  sympathies  for  two  young  and  attractive  lives,  and 
proceeds  to  bring  down  upon  them  wave  after  wave  of  calamity, 
which  come  upon  them  not  as  the  result  of  what  Romeo  and 
Juliet  have  done,  but  from  accident  and  circumstances  not  within 
their  control.  Instead  of  wrong  and  retribution,  we  have  in  this 
case  innocence  and  pathos.  Here  however  a  misconception  must 
be  avoided.  To  say  that  Romeo  and  Juliet  are  innocent  is  not 
the  same  thing  as  to  say  that  they  are  perfect.  No  one  cares  to 
discuss  whether  these  young  souls  had  not  their  full  share  of  ong^\ 
inal  sin ;  nor  is  it  relevant  to  inquire  whether  two  different  per- 
sons in  their  situation  might  or  might  not  have  acted  differently. 
The  essential  point  is  that  in  the  providential  dispensations  of 
Shakespeare's  story,  the  tragedy  overwhelming  the  lovers  is  brought 
about,  not  by  error  on  their  part,  but  by  circumstances  outside 
their  control,  by  what  is  to  them  external  accident. 

It  is  convenient  to  divide  the  course  of  the  story  into  three 
stages  :  there  is  the  original  entanglement  of  the  secret  marriage  ; 
there  is  the  accession  of  entanglement  in  the  banishment  of  Romeo  ; 
and  there  is  the  final  tragedy  of  the  fifth  act.  In  each  case  we  are 
to  see  the  essential  events  happening,  not  through  the  sin  or  error 
of  the  hero  or  heroine,  but  through  forces  outside  their  personal 
will. 

It  is,  I  suppose,  an  impertinence  for  grave  analysis  to  pry  into 
the  merry  mystery  of  boy  and  girl  love;  otherwise,  I  would  remark 
that  the  mode  in  which  Romeo  and  Juliet  become  attached  to  one 
another  brings  us  close  to  the  domain  of  the  accidental.  Some 
men  walk  into  love  with  their  eyes  open,  looking  to  the  right  and 
to  the  left,  and  above  all  looking  behind  to  see  that  their  retreat 
is  open  to  the  last  moment.  Others  glide  into  love,  yielding  half 
consciously  to  an  attraction  as  fundamental  as  gravitation.  Yet 
others,  by  their  phrase  '  falling  in  love,'  recognise  suddenness  and 
shock ;  an  even  higher  degree  of  suddenness  and  shock  is  found 
in  the  social  phenomenon  of  '  love  at  first  sight.'  Of  course  such 
love  at  first  sight  may,  in  some  cases,  be  no  more  than  the  quick- 
ening, under  favourable  surroundings,  of  what  would  under  other 


52  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

circumstances  have  come  about  more  gradually.  But  what  are  we 
to  say  of  the  cases  where  the  shock  of  a  momentary  meeting  has 
reversed  for  two  human  beings  the  whole  direction  in  which  each 
of  the  Hves  has  been  tending? 

In  the  natural  course  of  events  Romeo  and  Juliet  would  never 
have  met :  they  belong  to  famiUes  bitterly  at  feud,  and  Romeo, 
moreover,  is  in  love  with  a  Rosaline,  whose  unrequiting  coldness 
drives  him  to  desperation.  Accident  must  intervene  in  order  to 
bring  the  two  even  to  physical  proximity.  The  Capulets  are  giv- 
ing a  dance,  and  the  head  of  the  house  hands  his  servant  a  list 
of  guests  to  be  invited.  The  man  does  not  tell  his  master  that  he 
cannot  read  writing,  but,  outside  the  house,  must  ask  the  first  per- 
sons he  meets  to  decipher  the  paper  for  him.  By  accident,^  the 
first  persons  he  meets  are  a  party  of  Montagues,  Romeo  amongst 
them ;  the  name  of  RosaHne  among  those  invited  leads  Romeo 
to  accept  a  suggestion  of  a  surprise  mask.  Yet  at  the  door  of  the 
Capulet  house  —  so  does  our  story  quiver  with  the  accidental  — 
Romeo  is  all  but  backing  out ;  his  heart  is  too  heavy  with  Rosa- 
hne's  unkindness  for  his  heels  to  make  merry ;  at  last  he  goes  for- 
ward for  comradeship  sake.  Once  inside,  he  is  found  risking  his 
life  to  inquire  whose  is  the  beauty  that  has  smitten  him.^ 

O,  she  doth  teach  the  torches  to  burn  bright ! 
It  seems  she  hangs  upon  the  cheeks  of  night 
Like  a  rich  jewel  in  an  Ethiope's  ear. 

Juliet  at  first  has  not  seen  Romeo  under  his  mask ;  the  moment 
he  has  accosted   her,  her  words   speak  the   shock   of  helpless 

passion.^ 

If  he  be  married, 
My  grave  is  like  to  be  my  wedding  bed. 

An  instant's  encounter  has  reversed  the  whole  current  of  two 
lives ;  Juliet's  words  emphasise  this  sudden  reversal.* 

1  I.  ii.  34-106;  compare  L  iv.  ^  I.  v.  136. 

2Lv.  47.  *  L  V.  140. 


INNOCENCE  AND   PATHOS  53 

My  only  love  sprung  from  my  only  hate! 
Too  early  seen  unknown,  and  known  too  late! 
Prodigious  birth  of  love  it  is  to  me, 
That  I  must  love  a  loathed  enemy. 

Is  it  overstraining  to  say  that  such  reciprocal  passion  has  come 
as  an  external  shock  into  each  separate  life?  Suppose  the  story 
had  been  so  ordered  that,  at  this  ball  of  the  Capulets,  a  thunder- 
storm had  intervened,  and  Romeo  and  Juliet  by  two  successive 
flashes  had  been  instantly  killed  :  would  not  every  commentator 
have  recognised  a  story  of  most  remarkable  accident,  in  spite  of 
the  existence  of  a  science  of  electricity  ?  Not  less  accidental  than 
such  lightning  strokes  has  come  the  encounter  which,  in  an  instant 
affording  no  room  for  choice,  has  changed  Romeo  and  Juliet  from 
loathed  hereditary  foes  into  passionate  lovers  for  life. 

But  love  is  one  thing,  marriage  another ;  it  may  be  urged  that, 
while  Romeo  and  Juliet  have  without  their  consent  been  caught  in 
the  toils  of  passion,  yet  moral  responsibility  comes  in  with  the  fur- 
ther question,  whether  they  shall  yield  to  the  passion  or  resist. 
We  have  to  ask  then,  what  just  cause  or  impediment  there  is  why 
these  two  lovers  should  not  marry.  Is  it  the  impediment  of 
parental  objection?  It  might  be  a  delicate  matter  to  inquire  how 
far  parental  opposition  is  a  final  barrier  to  the  marriage  of  chil- 
dren ;  fortunately,  Shakespeare  has  so  moulded  his  story  that  this 
difficult  question  is  entirely  eliminated.  The  Montague's  voice  is 
recognised,  and  an  attempt  made  to  eject  him  from  the  Capulet 
house ;  the  head  of  the  house  forbids  this  infraction  of  hospitable 
honour,  and  in  the   altercation^   Juliet's  father  speaks  thus  of 

Romeo : 

He  bears  him  like  a  portly  gentleman ; 
And,  to  say  truth,  Verona  brags  of  him 
To  be  a  virtuous  and  well  govem'd  youth. 

No  higher  testimonial  could  be  given  by  any  father  to  the  worthi- 
ness of  a  suitor  for  his  daughter's  hand.     It  appears  then  that  the 

1 1.  V,  56-90. 


54  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

barrier  to  the  union  of  the  lovers  is  not  parental  authority,  but  the 
unrighteous  feud.  And  that  this  is  a  true  reading  of  the  situation 
we  may  call  for  confirmation  a  witness  from  the  story  itself.  The 
Friar  is  not  only  a  man  of  the  highest  character,  but  (according  to 
the  religious  ideas  of  the  time)  the  keeper  of  the  consciences  of 
Montagues  and  Capulets  alike.  That  he  understands  the  union  of 
Romeo  and  JuUet  to  be  barred  by  no  impediment  but  that  of  the 
feud  Father  Laurence  shows  by  his  consenting  secretly  to  perform 
the  wedding  ceremony ;  and  he  does  it  on  the  highest  grounds, 
in  the  hope  that  the  union  of  the  children  may  come  to  heal  the 
feud  of  the  parents.^ 

Thus  the  first  stage  of  the  story  is  complete.  A  marriage  that 
must  be  hushed  up  may  indeed  be  called  a  moral  entanglement. 
But  in  the  present  case  it  has  been  brought  about  by  no  error  on 
the  part  of  Romeo  and  Juliet ;  its  secrecy  is  the  necessary  result 
of  a  situation  of  affairs  for  which  they  are  in  no  way  respon- 
sible. 

There  is  an  accession  of  entanglement  when,  after  the  secret 
marriage  has  been  consummated,  the  husband  is  banished.  Care- 
less readers  of  the  play  have  spoken  of  Romeo  as  banished  for 
duelling.  Nothing  could  be  more  unjust ;  it  would  be  nearer  the 
truth  to  say  that  he  is  driven  into  exile  for  an  attempt  at  peace- 
making. 

This  section  of  the  story  brings  to  the  front  two  special  per- 
sonalities. Mercutio  is  unconnected  with  the  two  warring  fac- 
tions, and  is  kinsman  to  the  prince.  He  is  clearly  a  leading  figure 
in  Verona  society.  He  appears  to  be  a  man  of  exuberant  vitality ; 
brimming  over  with  riotous  fancies,  speaking  "  more  in  a  minute 
than  he  will  stand  to  in  a  month  "  ;  restless  for  the  cut  and  thrust 
of  wit,  and  the  cut  and  thrust  with  weapon.  His  irrepressible 
activity  is  kept  within  bounds  of  good  humour  —  with  one  excep- 
tion :  he  has  a  chronic  contempt  for  one  who  seems  his  artificial 
anti-type,  Tybalt,  who  takes  current  slang  for  wit,  and  makes 
duelling  an  end  in  itself. 

1 II.  iii.  90. 


INNOCENCE  AND   PATHOS  55 

O,  he  is  the  courageous  captain  of  complements.  He  fights  as 
you  sing  prick-song,  keeps  time,  distance,  and  proportion  ;  rests 
me  his  minim  rest,  one,  two,  and  the  third  in  your  bosom  :  the 
very  butcher  of  a  silk  button,  a  duellist,  a  duelHst ;  a  gentle- 
man of  the  very  first  house,  of  the  first  and  second  cause  :  ah, 
the  immortal  passado !  the  pauto  reverso!  the  hai!  .  .  .  The 
pox  of  such  antic,  lisping,  affecting  fantasticoes ;  these  new 
tuners  of  accents  !  ^ 

Mercutio  and  Tybalt,  with  lesser  persons,  make  up  an  atmosphere 
of  social  recklessness,  which  enables  us  to  measure  how  much  of 
moral  resistance  there  is  when  Romeo  refuses  a  challenge.  The 
circumstances  are  these.  Tybalt,  restrained  from  turning  Romeo 
out  of  Capulet's  house,  is  the  next  day  roaming  over  the  city 
to  seek  him :  Mercutio  has  met  Tybalt  and  is  holding  him  in 
check.^  By  perverse  fortune,  at  this  moment  Romeo  comes  upon 
them ;  Tybalt  glides  from  Mercutio's  sword  point  to  accost  the 
Montague,  and  hurls  at  him  in  public  the  word  '  villain.'  But  the 
husband  of  Juliet  holds  down  his  anger,  and  gives  a  dignified 
answer.  Mercutio  is  shocked  that  a  gentleman  wearing  a  sword 
should  not  have  drawn  in  a  moment  to  avenge  an  insult;  yet, 
good-humouredly,  Mercutio  with  his  ready  weapon  forces  Tybalt 
to  encounter  with  himself  instead  of  Romeo.  At  once  Romeo 
calls  upon  the  bystanders  to  separate  the  two :  he  and  Benvolio 
strike  down  the  weapons  of  the  combatants.  Thereupon  Tybalt 
by  "  an  envious  thrust "  under  the  arm  of  Romeo  gives  a  mortal 
wound  to  Mercutio.  Romeo  has  seen  a  friend,  interfering  to  save 
him,  murdered  ^  before  his  eyes ;  he  sees  Tybalt  furious  for  more 
blood  and  in  triumph.  Then  he  does  draw  his  sword;  he  is  un- 
happily too  successful ;  Tybalt  falls,  and  Romeo  is  subject  to  the 
doom  of  banishment. 

In  what  has  our  hero  done  wrong?      It  is  true  that  our  wiser 

1 II.  iv.  19.  2  III,  i.  38,  and  whole  scene. 

8  The  word  is  justified  by  a  comparison  of  III.  i.  173  with  line  108  of  the  same 
scene,  and  the  stage  direction  at  line  94.  Compare  also  Romeo's  words  in  lines 
1 14-6. 


56  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

modern  life  has  provided  for  such  a  contingency  by  its  institution 
of  the  poUce.  But,  when  we  are  deahng  with  general  conceptions 
of  right  and  wrong,  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  moral  indignation 
is  part  of  the  whole  duty  of  man.  The  prince  who  condemns 
Romeo  accepts  the  description  of  his  offence  as  no  more  than 
"  concluding  but  what  the  law  should  end,  the  Hfe  of  Tybalt."  ^ 
Romeo  is  banished,  not  on  account  of  the  quality  of  his  act,  but 
because  of  the  arbitrary  decree  against  street  fighting  drawn  from 
the  prince  by  feuds  of  Montague  and  Capulet.  This  second  stage 
of  the  entanglement  may  be  thus  summed  up  :  accident  has  brought 
i  Romeo  into  a  situation,  in  which  his  self-restraint,  and  attempt  at 
/peacemaking,  have  subjected  him  to  a  doom  instituted  on  account 
of  that  factious  violence  which  Romeo  has  just  been  resisting. 

The  final  phase  of  the  movement  is  ushered  in  by  the  suit  of 
Count  Paris  for  the  hand  of  Juliet.  The  offer  is  at  once  accepted 
by  her  father,  and  —  such  is  the  strange  entanglement  of  events  — 
the  death  of  Tybalt  has  made  it  possible  for  Capulet  to  dispense 
with  ceremony,  and  appoint  a  quiet  wedding  for  a  date  within  the 
week  of  the  proposal.^  There  is  no  time  to  concert  measures  with 
Romeo.  What  is  Juliet  to  do?  Will  it  be  suggested  that  she 
might  confess  all  to  her  parents,  relying  on  the  fact  that  a  mar- 
riage is  a  thing  which  cannot  be  undone  ?  But  we  must  remember 
the  type  of  parent  in  the  case.  When  Juliet  shows  the  first  sign 
of  resistance  to  the  idea  of  wedding  within  a  day  or  two  a  man  who 
has  never  asked  her  for  her  love,  her  mother  in  a  moment  takes 
fire,  and  the  father  no  less  quickly  catches  the  heat.^ 

Capulet.    Soft!  take  me  with  you,  take  me  with  you,  wife. 

How!  will  she  none  ?  doth  she  not  give  us  thanks? 
Is  she  not  proud  ? 

Juliet's  answer  is  a  model  of  respect  tempering  firmness  : 

Juliet.        Proud  can  I  never  be  of  what  I  hate ; 

But  thankful  even  for  hate,  that  is  meant  love. 

I  III.  i.  191,  *  III.  iv.  23.  8  III.  V.  37,  and  whole  scene. 


INNOCENCE  AND  PATHOS  57 

The  father's  temper  explodes. 

Capulet.    Thank  me  no  thankings,  nor  proud  me  no  prouds, 
But  fettle  your  fine  joints  'gainst  Thursday  next, 
To  go  with  Paris  to  Saint  Peter's  Church, 
Or  I  will  drag  thee  on  a  hurdle  thither.  — 

Foul  language  follows,  until  even  Lady  Capulet  and  the  Nurse 
have  to  interpose.  Is  confidence  possible  with  parents  like  these  ? 
Lady  Capulet  was  for  having  Romeo  poisoned  over  in  Mantua, 
merely  on  account  of  Tybalt's  death ;  ^  had  it  become  known  that 
a  union  with  that  hated  Montague  stood  between  Juliet  and  a  great 
match,  would  Romeo's  life  have  been  worth  an  hour's  purchase? 

Juliet  sees  no  escape  from  the  entanglement  but  death.  She  is 
ready  to  die,  but,  with  pious  self-control,  seeks  the  sanction  of  the 
Church.  This  brings  out  the  Friar's  magnificent  scheme.  Friar 
Laurence  is  not  only  a  strong,  calm  soul  in  the  midst  of  a  world 
of  the  passionate  ;  not  only  a  leading  ecclesiastic  of  the  city  with 
Capulets  and  Montagues  alike  for  his  penitents ;  he  further  repre- 
sents the  mystic  science  of  the  primitive  time,  and  knows  how,  by 
herbal  draughts  he  can  compound,  to  reduce  vigorous  youth  to  the 
appearance  of  a  corpse  ready  for  the  sepulchre,  draughts  com- 
pounded with  such  precision  that  at  the  end  of  two  and  forty 
hours  Juliet  shall  awake  as  from  pleasant  sleep  to  perfect  health. 
And  the  daring  experiment  fulfils  itself  to  the  exact  minute.^ 

But  if  we  admire  the  scheme  of  the  Friar,  what  shall  we  say  of 
the  heroism  of  Juliet  who  carries  it  out?  Unlike  the  patient  of  real 
life,  whom  nature  prepares  by  wasting  pain  for  a  welcome  release, 
Juliet  must  in  full  flush  of  strong  life  go  through  the  bitterness  of 
death.^  She  bids  an  ordinary  *  Good  Night '  to  her  mother  and 
nurse,  and  in  low  whisper  adds  : 

God  knows  when  we  shall  meet  again. 

1  III.  V.  89. 

2  IV.  i.  105,  and  whole  speech ;  compare  V.  iii,  257,  and  whole  speech. 

8  Compare  the  whole  scene  :  IV.  iii.  The  abrupt  transitions  of  thought  in  Juliet's 
soliloquy  must  be  carefully  studied,  as  indications  of  changes  in  the  scene  she 
imagines. 


58  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

She  finds  herself —  perhaps  for  the  first  time  in  her  young  Hfe  — 
alone  at  night ;  she  can  hardly  restrain  herself  from  calling  the 
nurse  back.  But  the  dread  deed  needs  solitude.  JuHet  draws 
from  its  secret  place  the  Friar's  gift,  and  marks  the  transparent 
phial  with  its  colourless  liquid ;  innocent  looking  as  water,  can  it, 
she  wonders,  produce  such  strange  effects,  and  will  she  not  awake 
with  morning,  to  be  dragged  to  the  altar  ?  That  at  least  must  never 
be  j  and  Juliet,  taking  some  stiletto-like  ornament  of  a  girl's  dress, 
lays  it  ready,  a  last  resort  by  which  she  will  be  faithful  to  her  mar- 
riage vow.  She  looks  at  the  phial  again,  and  the  opposite  thought 
strikes  her:  what  if  it  is  poison?  The  idea  gains  probabiHty; 
none  but  the  Friar  and  herself  know  of  the  secret  marriage,  and  if 
she  were  out  of  the  way  —  but  she  checks  herself,  and  knows  the 
Friar  for  a  holy  man.  At  last  the  phial  is  uncorked,  and  Juliet 
catches  a  whiff  of  strange  odour.  Scientists  have  noted  that  nothing 
is  more  powerful  in  exciting  trains  of  mental  association  than  the 
sense  of  smell.  As  the  sickly  fumes  pervade  the  atmosphere  of 
the  chamber  Juliet's  brain  begins  to  take  fire.  She  catches  the 
awful  thought  of  awaking  too  soon;  she  realises  the  strangling 
sensation  of  the  stifling  vault,  all  the  terrors  of  the  tomb  around 
her,  the  unearthly  shrieks  from  which  passers-by  will  flee  in  horror ; 
she  fancies  herself  unable  to  move  without  disturbing  the  dust  of 
dead  ancestors,  ready  to  dash  her  brains  out  with  what  comes 
nearest  and  finding  this  the  bone  of  some  forefather.  Not  ances- 
tors alone ;  her  quickened  mind  play  recollects  Tybalt  newly  borne 
to  the  family  vault ;  she  seems  to  see  the  white  shroud,  and  hor- 
rible curiosity  would  peer  through  to  the  festering  corpse  beneath. 
But  the  tumult  of  imaginative  associations  is  working  itself  out  to 
the  natural  climax  of  a  Romeo  approaching  to  the  rescue.  At 
this  point  the  trains  of  association  clash :  the  white  shroud  seems 
to  rise,  as  Tybalt  seeks  the  man  who  spitted  him  upon  his  rapier's 
point.  Wildly  Juliet  essays  to  save  her  lover,  and  feels  herself 
held  back  by  some  strong  bar ;  in  vague  confusion  she  leaps  to  the 
thought  that  life  is  the  bar  holding  her  from  this  scene  of  the 
sepulchre,  and  that  the  phial  is  the  way  of  escape. 


INNOCENCE  AND   PATHOS  59 

Stay,  Tybalt,  stay! 
Romeo,  I  come !  this  do  I  drink  to  thee. 

She  puts  the  phial  to  her  lips,  and  falls  insensible. 

The  magnificent  scheme  of  the  Friar,  the  heroism  of  Juliet  in 
executing  it,  all  is  rendered  useless  by  the  accidental  detention 
of  Friar  John.^  This  is  the  hinge  of  accident  on  which  the  whole 
issue  turns.  As  part  of  Friar  Laurence's  scheme,  a  messenger 
must  apprise  Romeo  of  what  is  being  done.  The  careful  mes- 
senger knows  that  travellers  may  miscarry,  and  Friar  John^seelJs 
another  triar  of  his  order  to  accompany  him  for  greater  security. 
They  are  starting,  when  the  door  of  the  house  is  suddenly  barred 
by  the  searchers  of  the  town ;  the  house  is  declared  infected  by 
the  plague,  and  none  may  leave  it.  The  messenger  is  helpless, 
and  meanwhile  the  false  news  ^  is  borne  to  Romeo.  His  view  of 
life  is  not  ours ;  long  before  this  Romeo  had  announced  his  simple 
creed : 

Do  thou  but  close  our  hands  with  holy  words  : 
Then  love-devouring  death  do  what  he  dare ; 
It  is  enough  I  may  but  call  her  mine.^ 

With  the  news  of  Juliet's  death  there  is  nothing  left  in  life  for 
Romeo.  The  Apothecary  —  evil  counterpart  to  the  Friar,  with 
mystic  drugs  that  kill  instead  of  mystic  drugs  that  heal  —  finds 
the  means.  Romeo  hastens  to  the  sepulchre  of  the  Capulets  to 
join  his  love  in  her  death. 

It  is  night,*  that  which  was  to  have  been  the  bridal  night  of 
Paris  j  he  has  come  with  floral  offerings  to  the  tomb  of  the  Capu- 
lets. The  pious  obsequies  are  interrupted,  and  a  torch  is  seen 
cleaving  the  dark :  some  cursed  robber  or  insulter  of  the  dead, 
Paris  thinks.  The  thought  is  confirmed  as  Romeo,  dismissing  his 
page,  seeks  to  put  him  on  a  false  scent,  and  speaks  of  descending 
to  the  bed  of  death  and  taking  a  precious  ring  from  a  dead  finger. 
Paris  can  see  the  figure  advance,  the  torch  planted  in  the  ground, 

1  V.  ii,  5 ;  compare  V.  ill.  251.  ^11.  vi.  6. 

2  V.  i,  I.  *  V.  iii,  whole  scene. 


60  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  mattock  raised  against  the  very  sepulchre  of  Juliet ;  more  than 
this,  he  recognises  the  face  of  a  Montague.  He  leaps  from  his 
concealment  to  arrest  the  felon  in  the  act.  It  is  in  vain  that 
Romeo  seeks  to  restrain  him,  and  bids  him  not  tempt  a  desper- 
ate man :  by  the  flickering  torchlight  swords  cross,  and  again 
Romeo's  sword  is  unhappily  successful;  Paris  lies  bleeding  to 
death,  with  his  last  breath  begging  to  be  laid  in  the  tomb  with 
Juliet.  Then  Romeo  recalls  dim  recollections  of  another  suitor ; 
he  obeys  the  dying  request,  and  taking  up  the  body  he  bears  it 
into  the  sepulchre.  But  lo  !  he  seems  to  see,  not  a  sepulchre, 
rather  a  glorious  lantern^  lit  up  with  the  loveliness  of  Juliet. 
Romeo  had  been  steeling  his  heart  to  endure  the  dread  sight  of 
death's  defacement ;  on  the  contrary,  what  he  finds  is  fulness  of 
the  beauty  he  loves  so  well.  For  the  forty-two  hours  are  almost 
expired,  and  the  returning  tide  of  health  is  nearing  its  flood  point ; 
the  pallor  of  death  has  passed  away,  and  beauty's  ensign  is  crim- 
son in  lips  and  cheek.  Romeo  hangs  over  the  body  enamoured ; 
the  wonder  fills  him  that  death  himself  should  turn  amorous,  and 
keep  Juliet  in  the  dark  grave  as  his  paramour.  Each  moment 
the  returning  tide  of  life  is  gathering  fulness ;  the  eyelids  are 
lying  as  light  as  snowflakes  on  the  longed-for  eyes ;  the  lips  seem 
as  if  at  any  moment  they  might  part  and  let  the  fragrant  breath 
come  through.  The  agony  of  love  is  more  than  Romeo  can  bear, 
and  there  is  but  one  way  to  possess  all  this  beauty. 

O  true  apothecary  ! 
Thy  drugs  are  quick.     Thus  with  a  kiss  I  die. 

Then  the  forty- two  hours  have  expired;  the  returning  tide  of  life 
has  reached  its  flood  point.  As  with  a  dreamer  on  the  verge  of 
waking,  Juliet's  consciousness  is  of  some  place  where  she  ought 
to  be,  and  that  she  is  there  ;  sound  of  approaching  footsteps  and 
a  familiar  voice  strengthen  the  impression ;  she  opens  her  eyes,  and 
all  is  true. 

O  comfortable  friar  !  where  is  my  lord  ? 

1  Romeo's  own  word :  V.  iii.  84. 


INNOCENCE  AND   PATHOS  6 1 

A  moment  later  she  has  taken  in  the  whole  scene.  In  vain  the 
Friar  seeks  to  get  her  away,  for  the  watch  is  heard  approaching. 
Juliet  can  only  feel  bitterly  that  her  lover  has  left  her  behind. 

0  churl !  drunk  all,  and  left  no  friendly  drop 
To  help  me  after? 

But  there  is  his  dagger,  and  with  this  she  can  find  a  way  of  follow- 
ing. So  the  three  lie  side  by  side,  —  Paris,  Romeo,  Juliet,  —  and 
the  triple  tragedy  has  all  been  brought  about  by  that  accidental 
detention  of  Friar  John. 

The  plot  of  this  play  has  fully  unfolded  itself;  what  has  been 
its  dominant  motive?  In  the  dim  background  of  the  story,  for 
those  who  care  to  look  for  it,  may  be  seen  a  providence  of  retri- 
bution :  evil  has  brought  forth  evil,  where  the  feud  of  the  parents 
has  caused  the  death  of  the  children.  This  retribution  is  seen 
balanced  by  its  opposite,  for  the  heroism  of  Juliet  is  a  good  that 
but  brings  forth  evil.  But  in  the  foreground,  at  every  turn  of  the 
movement,  we  see  emphasised  the  strange  work  of  providence  by 
which  accident  mocks  the  best  concerted  schemes  of  man ;  pity, 
not  terror,  is  the  emotion  of  the  poem.  It  is  accident  which  has 
brought  Romeo  and  JuHet  together,  and  they  have  loved  without 
sin ;  accident  has  converted  Romeo's  self-restraint  into  the  entan- 
glement of  exile  from  his  bride ;  the  smallest  of  accidents  has 
been  sufficient  to  turn  deep  wisdom  and  devoted  heroism  into 
a  tragedy  that  engulfs  three  innocent  lives. 

There  are  certain  passages  of  the  play  into  which  have  been 
read  suggestions  of  folly  and  its  penalty,  but  which  in  truth  are 
entirely  in  tune  with  the  prevailing  impression  of  irresistible  cir- 
cumstance.    When  Juliet  says  ^  — 

1  have  no  joy  of  this  contract  to-night : 
It  is  too  rash,  too  unadvised,  too  sudden ; 
Too  like  the  lightning,  which  doth  cease  to  be 
Ere  one  can  say, '  It  lightens ' :  — 

1 II.  ii.  117. 


62  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

and  Romeo  answers  — 

I  am  afeard, 
Being  in  night,  all  this  is  but  a  dream, 
Too  flattering-sweet  to  be  substantial :  — 

the  two  are  not  making  confession  of  faulty  rashness :  it  is  only 
the  common  thought  of  new-born  love,  that  it  is  too  good  to  be 
true.     Similarly,  when  the  Friar  says  to  Romeo  ^  — 

These  violent  delights  have  violent  ends  .  .  . 
Therefore  love  moderately ;  — 

he  is  not  blaming,  but  fearing  :  his  own  action  shows  that  this  is  the 
sense.  The  Friar  justly  rebukes  the  desperate  fury  of  Romeo  at 
the  sentence  of  banishment ;  ^  but  this  fault  of  Romeo  does  not 
affect  the  movement  of  events,  for  he  does  not  act  upon  his  fury, 
but  on  the  contrary  lays  it  aside,  and  submits  to  the  counsel  of  his 
spiritual  adviser  —  the  counsel  which  eventually  turns  to  his  ruin. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  may  be  said  that  in  this  more  than  in  any 
other  play  Shakespeare  comes  near  to  being  a  commentator  on  him- 
self, and  to  giving  us  his  own  authority  for  the  true  interpretation. 
In  the  prologue  it  is  the  author  who  speaks  :  this  opening  of  the 
plot  exhibits,  not  sin  and  its  consequences,  but  a  suggestion  of 
entangling  circumstance  ;  when  he  speaks  of  the  "  fatal  loins  "  of 
the  parents,  the  "  star-cross'd  lovers,"  and  their  "  misadventured 
piteous  overthrows,"  Shakespeare  is  using  the  language  of  destiny 
and  pathos.  For  what  is  spoken  in  the  scenes  the  speakers  alone 
are  responsible  ;  yet  a  succession  of  striking  passages  has  the  effect 
of  carrying  on  the  suggestion  of  the  prologue  —  dramatic  fore- 
shadowings,  unconscious  finger-pointings  to  the  final  tragedy,  just 
like  the  shocks  of  omen  that  in  ancient  drama  brought  out  the 
irony  of  fate.  Romeo  on  the  threshold  of  the  Capulet  mansion 
has  such  a  foreshadowing. 

My  mind  misgives 
Some  consequence,  yet  hanging  in  the  stars. 
Shall  bitterly  begin  his  fearful  date 
With  this  night's  revels,  and  expire  the  term 

III.  vi.  9.  2  jii.  iii^  from  24. 


INNOCENCE  AND   TATHOS  63 

Of  a  despised  life  closed  in  my  breast 
By  some  vile  forfeit  of  untimely  death. 
But  He,  that  hath  the  steerage  of  my  course, 
Direct  my  sail !  ^ 

The  feeling  recurs  just  as  the  encounter  with  swords  is  entering  its 
last  phase. 

This  day's  black  fate  on  more  days  doth  depend. ^ 

A  shock  of  ill-omen  visits  Juliet,  as  she  watches  Romeo  descend 
the  rope  ladder  to  go  into  exile. 

0  God !  I  have  an  ill-divining  soul ! 
Methinks  I  see  thee,  now  thou  art  below, 
As  one  dead  in  the  bottom  of  a  tomb.^ 

In  ominous  phrase  Lady  Capulet's  petulance  expresses  itself  when 

her  daughter  resists  the  suit  of  Paris  : 

1  would  the  fool  were  married  to  her  grave !  * 
Strangely  ironic  is  the  language  in  which  Juliet  begs  for  time. 

Delay  this  marriage  for  a  month,  a  week ; 
Or,  if  you  do  not,  make  the  bridal  bed 
In  that  dim  monument  where  Tybalt  lies.^ 

And  there  is  botl\  irony  andweird  j)mcn  in  the  unnatural  elation 
with  which  Romeo  is  awaiting  the  messenger  of  doom  : 

My  dreams  presage  some  joyful  news  at  hand  ... 
I  dreamt  my  lady  came  and  found  me  dead  — 
Strange  dream,  that  gives  a  dead  man  leave  to  think !  — 
And  breathed  such  life  with  kisses  in  my  lips, 
That  I  revived,  and  was  an  emperor.^ 

In  passages  like  these  Destiny  itself  seems  to  be  speaking  through 
the  lips  of  the  dramatis  personse.  In  their  more  ordinary  speech 
the  personages  of  the  play  reiterate  the  one  idea  of  fortune  and 

1  I.  iv.  106.  8  Jii,  V.  54.  5  III.  V.  202. 

2  III.  i.  124.  4  III.  V.  141.  6  V.  i.  I. 


64  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

fate.  Romeo  after  the  fall  of  Tybalt  feels  that  he  is  "  fortune's 
fool."  ^    The  Friar  takes  the  same  view  :  ^ 

Romeo,  come  forth  ;  come  forth,  thou  fearful  man : 
Affliction  is  enamour^  of  thy  parts, 
And  thou  art  wedded  to  calamity : 

he  sees  in  the  banished  husband  a  prodigy  of  ill  luck,^  misfortune 
has  fallen  in  love  with  him.  Juliet  feels  the  same  burden  of 
hostile  iatej 

Alack,  alack,  that  heaven  should  practice  stratagems 
Upon  so  soft  a  subject  as  myself  !  ^ 

Romeo  recognises  the  slain  Paris  as  "  one  writ  with  me  in  sour 
misfortune's  book  " ;  his  last  fatal  act  is  a  struggle  "  to  shake  the 
yoke  of  inauspicious  stars  from  this  world- wearied  flesh."  ^  The 
wisdom  of  the  Friar  receives  the  detention  of  the  messenger 
as  "  unhappy  fortune  "  j  in  the  final  issue  of  events  he  trembhngly 
feels  how  "  an  unkind  hour  is  guilty  of  this  lamentable  chance," 
how  "  a  greater  power  than  we  can  contradict  hath  thwarted  our 
intents."  ^  The  note  struck  by  the  prologue  rings  in  the  final 
couplet  of  the  poem  :  no  moral  lesson  is  read,  but  the  word  pathos 
is  found  in  its  simple  English  equivalent  — 

For  never  was  a  story  of  more  woe 
Than  this  of  Juliet  and  her  Romeo. 

1  III.  i.  141.  2  in.  iii.  I. 

8  Many  commentators,  and  even  Schmidt's  Lexicon,  understand y!rar/S</  as  Hmid. 
But  the  context  seems  decisive  for  the  other  sense  —  terrible  to  contemplate. 
4  in.  V,  211.  5  V.  iii.  82,  III. 

6  V.  ii.  17 ;  V.  iii.  145 ;  V.  iii.  153. 


IV 


WRONG  AND    RESTORATION:     THE  COMEDIES  OF   WINTER'S 
TALE  AND    CYMBELINE 

The  present  work  treats  dramatic  plot  as  a  revelation  of  moral 
providence ;  the  successive  plays  are  microcosms,  and  some  as- 
pect of  the  universe  appears  for  each  as  a  binding  force  in  which 
the  many-sided  characters  and  incidents  find  their  harmony.  In 
one  play  we  have  thus  seen  innocence  and  pathos,  in  another 
wrong  and  retribution.  But  the  evil  of  Hfe  admits  of  yet  another 
treatment :  wrong  may  find  its  restoration.  Redemption,  the 
profoundest  of  moral  principles,  is  also  an  ideal  of  the  poet.  But 
poetry  is  not  the  same  thing  as  theology.  Its  mission  is  not  to 
unfold  a  plan  of  salvation ;  but  it  gives  recognition  to  the  work  of 
restoration  in  human  life,  and  clothes  this  with  artistic  beauty, 
especially  giving  to  it  those  touches  of  balance  and  symmetry 
which  make  up  so  large  a  part  of  poetical  idealisation.  Two 
dramas  suggest  themselves  as  special  studies  of  Wrong  and  Res- 
toration—  Wintet^s  Tale  and  Cymbeline.  To  the  analyst  the  two 
have  much  in  common.  In  the  bare  anatomy  of  plot  the  plays 
are  bound  together  by  their  sixfold  basis  of  structure ;  in  each 
Shakespeare  has  borrowed  from  ancient  literature  the  device  of 
the  oracle,  not  an  external  force  governing  events,  but  the  empha- 
sis by  supernatural  revelation  of  a  result  otherwise  accomplished. 
The  very  difference  of  the  two  poems  gives  the  link  of  contrast. 
JVinfer's  Tale  presents  wrong  and  restoration  in  the  simplest  form ; 
in  Cymbeline  similar  elements  of  story  are  seen  highly  elaborated 
into  what  is  perhaps  the  most  complex  of  Shakespearean  dramas. 

In  Winter's  Tale  the  whole  wrong  is  comprehended  in  the 
passion  of  Leontes.  Not  only  is  this  a  single  thing,  but  —  to  do 
F  6s 


66  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

it  justice  —  in  the  scale  of  guilt  we  must  rank  it  low.  There  are 
wrongs  which  are  infinitely  bad  when  looked  at  in  themselves,  but 
which  impress  us  differently  if  we  consider  them  as  revelations  of 
the  wrong-doer.  This  is  especially  true  of  jealousy.  In  another 
of  Shakespeare's  plays  we  have  two  notable  types  of  this  passion 
side  by  side  :  lago's  jealousy  is  the  natural  outcome  of  a  nature 
wholly  depraved ;  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  the  transparent  guile- 
lessness  of  Othello  that  makes  it  possible  for  lago  to  work  him 
up  to  his  frenzy  of  suspicion.  The  jealousy  of  Leontes  is  of  this 
latter  type.  If  we  inquire  as  to  the  general  character  of  the 
Sicilian  King,  apart  from  the  one  crisis  of  his  life,  three  powerful 
witnesses  speak  for  its  depth  and  truth.  The  tale  tells  of  an  ideal 
friendship,  like  the  friendship  of  David  and  Jonathan,  or  Damon 
and  Pythias :  such  friendships  can  subsist  only  between  true 
natures.  In  the  same  direction  point  the  wifely  devotion  of  so 
high-souled  a  wife  as  Hermione,  and  the  passionate  attachment 
of  the  counsellor  who  in  the  past  has  had  the  close  intercourse 
of  confidential  adviser,  an  attachment  bringing  Camillo  back  to 
Sicily  after  injury  and  years  of  exile.^  The  outburst  of  jealousy 
in  the  play  is  not  villany,  but  moral  disease ;  it  is  a  fever  fit,  and 
moral  fevers,  like  physical,  make  the  greatest  ravages  in  the  strong- 
est constitutions.  It  is  noticeable  that  the  person  of  the  play  who 
has  the  best  opportunity  for  observing  Leontes  uses  the  language 
of  disease.  At  the  first  symptom  of  the  King's  morbid  imagina- 
tion Camillo  cries : 

Good  my  lord,  be  cured 

Of  this  diseased  opinion,  and  betimes ; 

For  'tis  most  dangerous.^ 

When  Camillo  feels  the  case  hopeless,  and  has  to  open  the  matter 
to  Polixenes  his  speech  is  similar  : 

There  is  a  sickness 
Which  puts  some  of  us  in  distemper,  but 
I  cannot  name  the  disease ;  and  it  is  caught 
Of  you  that  yet  are  well.* 

1 IV.  ii.  1-32  ;  IV.  iv,  from  519.  ^l.ii.  296.  8  i.  ii.  384. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  6/ 

Polixenes  thinks  of  using  reason  to  his  friend  j   Camillo  knows 

better. 

Swear  his  thought  over 
By  each  particular  star  in  heaven  and 
By  all  their  influences,  you  may  as  well 
Forbid  the  sea  for  to  obey  the  moon, 
As  or  by  oath  remove  or  counsel  shake 
The  fabric  of  his  folly. ^ 

Of  course,  we  are  responsible  for  our  moral,  as  for  our  physical, 
health.  The  sin  of  Leontes  has  been  the  unguarded  heart  which 
has  allowed  jealousy  to  enter.  But  once  the  morbid  passion  has 
passed  beyond  a  certain  point,  it  is  as  vain  to  denounce  the  further 
outrages  of  Leontes  as  it  would  be  to  parse  the  ravings  of  dehrium. 
The  origin  of  the  wrong  is  outside  the  field  of  view ;  Bohemia's 
long  visit  has  been  a  period  of  incubation  for  the  poison  germs, 
and  the  first  we  see  of  Leontes  is  as  when  by  the  stethoscope  a 
heart  disease  has  suddenly  been  revealed  in  an  advanced  stage. 
At  the  beginning  of  the  scene  ^  Leontes  is  still  struggling  against 
what  he  feels  to  be  unworthy ;  like  the  honourable  man  he  is,  he 
makes  such  suspicions  a  reason  for  urging  a  longer  visit;  nay, 
he  calls  upon  his  queen  to  second  the  invitation.  But  when  the 
responsive  eloquence  of  Hermione  has  proved  successful,  the 
bitterness  of  the  husband's  heart  comes  to  the  surface  in  words : 

Leont.   At  my  request  he  would  not. 

Leontes  recovers  himself,  and   turns  to  his  wife  with  the  most 
graceful  of  speeches. 

Leont.   Hermione,  my  dearest,  thou  never  spokest 

To  better  purpose. 
Her.  Never? 

Leont.  Never,  but  once  .  .  .  when 

Three  crabbed  months  had  sour'd  themselves  to  death 

Ere  I  could  make  thee  open  thy  white  hand. 

And  clap  thyself  my  love. 

1 1,  ii.  424.  2  I.  ii. 


68  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

But  the  effort  is  too  much  for  Leontes  :  ^  he  has  tremor  cordis,  his 
heart  dances  but  not  for  joy.  He  must  turn  aside  and  play  with 
his  Httle  son.  Yet  he  can  reason^  with  his  'affection'  —  the 
Shakespearean  word  for  *  passion ' : 

With  what's  unreal  thou  coactive  art, 
And  fellow'st  nothing  — 

but  this  restraining  thought  suggests  its  opposite  : 

then  'tis  very  credent 
Thou  mayst  co-join  with  something ;  and  thou  dost. 

The  King  would  be  alone,  and  bids  the  Queen  take  charge  of  her 

guest. 

I  am  angling  now, 
Though  you  perceive  me  not  how  I  give  line. 

The  passion  of  jealousy,  indulged,  now  rushes  with  full  flood.^ 

Go,  play,  boy,  play :  thy  mother  plays,  and  I 
Play  too ;  but  so  disgraced  a  part,  whose  issue 
Will  hiss  me  to  my  grave. 

We  can  see  clearly  the  psychology  of  jealousy  in  such  cases  as 
Leontes  and  Othello :  the  thing  imagined  is  so  abhorrent  to  a 
pure  soul,  that  the  very  shame  of  it  inflames  the  imagination,  and 
suspicions  become  realities  too  strong  for  the  discrimination  of 
judgment.  Leontes  no  longer  hesitates  to  confide  his  thought 
to  the  clear-sighted  Camillo ;  the  thought  now  spoken  in  all  its 
details,  for  the  purpose  of  convincing  the  horrified  friend,  con- 
vinces beyond  recovery  the  diseased  thinker.*  Camillo  sees  that 
he  must  affect  to  enter  into  the  plot  against  Pohxenes  in  order  to 
save  him.  Of  course,  when  the  two  have  fled  from  Sicily,  this 
comes  as  full  confirmation ;  all  that  is  seen  around  Leontes  is  one 
great  conspiracy.^  It  is  in  vain  that  the  King  is  encountered  by 
the  injured  innocence  of  the   stately  Hermione,   by  the   blank 

1 1,  ii,  from  io8.  8  j.  jj,  187. 

21.11.138-46.  *  I.  ii,  from  267.  6  II.  i.  47,  and  whole  scene. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  69 

amazement  of  the  courtiers,  which  Antigonus  expresses  with  a 
blunt  force  that  makes  its  coarseness  pardonable :  jealousy  is 
a  flame  that  converts  obstacles  into  fresh  fuel,  and  to  Leontes 
the  lords  are  so  many  blind  fools,  the  queen's  guilt  has  put  on 
its  natural  hypocrisy.^  The  little  son's  illness  is  announced  :  it 
becomes  fresh  evidence. 

To  see  his  nobleness ! 
Conceiving  the  dishonour  of  his  mother, 
He  straight  declined.^ 

The  new-born  infant  is  laid  before  the  King  — 

.  .  .  the  whole  matter 
And  copy  of  the  father,  eye,  nose,  lip. 
The  trick  of 's  frown,  his  forehead,  nay,  the  valley. 
The  pretty  dimples  of  his  chin  and  cheek  ;  his  smiles  : 
The  very  mould  and  frame  of  hand,  nail,  finger^  — 

but  all  this  hardens  the  morbid  heart,  and  Leontes  cries  to  com- 
mit the  brat  and  its  adulterous  dam  to  the  flames.  All  this  while 
Leontes  is  conscious  of  honesty  and  justice.  His  second  thought 
of  having  the  babe  carried  by  Antigonus  to  some  lonely  spot  in 
Bohemia,  "some  place  when  chance  may  nurse  or  end  it,"  is 
meant  by  the  King,  and  understood  by  the  court,  as  an  appeal  to 
providence."*  And  —  to  convince  others,  not  himself — the  King 
has  sent  to  the  infallible  oracle  :  ^ 

Let  us  be  clear'd 
Of  being  tyrannous,  since  we  so  openly 
Proceed  in  justice,  which  shall  have  due  course, 
Even  to  the  guilt  or  the  purgation. 

But  when  the  thunderbolt  of  the  oracle  falls,^  even  this  cannot 
stop  the  headlong  course  of  jealous  frenzy : 

There  is  no  truth  at  all  i'  the  oracle : 
The  sessions  shall  proceed. 

1  II.  i,  from  126,  2  II.  iii.  12.  8  11.  iii.  98,  and  whole  scene. 

*  II.  iii,  from  154;  compare  line  183,  and  III.  iii.  41-6. 

6  11.  i.  180,  189;  III.  ii.  4.  6  III.  ii,  from  133. 


yo  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  fever  has  reached  the  full  crisis,  when  a  shock  must  kill  or 
cure.  The  shock  comes  in  the  announcement,  at  that  very  in- 
stant, of  the  boy's  death. 

Apollo's  angry ;  and  the  heavens  themselves 
Do  strike  at  my  injustice. 

The  shock  repeats  itself:  for  the  news  seems  mortal  to  the 
fainting  queen.  Leontes  has  in  a  moment  recovered  his  full 
sanity :  but  it  is  the  crushed  helplessness  that  succeeds  when  the 
fever  crisis  has  passed. 

Thou  canst  not  speak  too  much ;  I  have  deserved 

All  tongues  to  talk  their  bitterest.  .  .  .  Prithee,  bring  me 

To  the  dead  bodies  of  my  queen  and  son  : 

One  grave  shall  be  for  both ;  upon  them  shall 

The  causes  of  their  death  appear,  unto 

Our  shame  perpetual.     Once  a  day  I'll  visit 

The  chapel  where  they  lie,  and  tears  shed  there 

Shall  be  my  recreation  :  so  long  as  nature 

Will  bear  up  with  this  exercise,  so  long 

I  daily  vow  to  use  it. 

The  oracle  thus  brought  to  the  trial  of  the  queen  is  the  motive 
centre  of  the  play,  in  which  all  the  lines  of  plot  meet.^ 

Hermione  is  chaste ; 

Polixenes  blameless ; 

Camillo  a  true  subject ; 

Leontes  a  jealous  tyrant ; 

His  innocent  babe  truly  begotten ; 
And  the  king  shall  live  without  an  heir, 
If  that  which  is  lost  be  not  found. 

The  first  part  of  the  oracle,  clear  as  a  flash  of  lightning,  has  laid 
bare  at  a  single  stroke  the  whole  wrong  of  Leontes.  It  is  a  six- 
fold woe  he  has  incurred.  He  has  lost  the  wife  he  adores ;  he 
has  lost  the  friend  of  his  bosom ;  he  has  lost  his  pretty  son  and 

1  See  below,  Appendix,  page  350. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  ft 

his  new-born  daughter;  he  has  lost  the  minister  Camillo,  with 
whom  he  had  taken  Hfelong  counsel :  and  he  has  lost  the  loyal 
servant,  Antigonus,  who  so  unwiUingly  has  gone  to  execute  a  cruel 
doom.  But  in  its  latter  clauses  the  oracle  is  the  dim  revelation, 
which  can  be  read  only  by  the  light  of  fulfilment.  Latent  in  its 
mystic  phrase  is  the  sixfold  restoration  :  the  wife  is  to  be  received 
as  from  the  tomb,  the  friend  to  be  again  embraced  in  Sicilia ;  the 
lost  babe  will  reappear  a  lovely  daughter ;  the  lost  son  will  be 
replaced  by  a  son-in-law  who  is  the  image  of  Polixenes  as  known 
in  his  youth.  Camillo  will  return,  unable  to  live  without  his  king ; 
and  if  Antigonus  himself  has  been  caught  in  the  doom  of  which 
he  is  minister,  it  is  his  widow,  the  faithful  Paulina,  to  whom  has 
been  committed  the  chief  ministry  of  restoration. 

The  play  divides  at  its  centre  :  the  work  of  wrong  is  balanced 
by  the  working  out  of  restoration.  An  interval  of  time,  indicated 
by  a  chorus,  allows  the  babe  to  grow  up  into  a  girl  of  sixteen ; 
the  scene  shifts  from  Sicilia  to  Bohemia.  But  these  are  small 
points  in  comparison  with  the  total  change  of  spirit  which  the  great 
master  of  plot  suddenly  brings  over  his  drama :  in  a  moment  we 
find  ourselves  in  a  new  world.  A  change  from  verse  to  prose 
appropriately  ushers  in  the  passage  from  high  life,  with  grand  pas- 
sions and  court  intrigues,  to  the  remote  recesses  of  the  country, 
and  the  rude  pastoral  manners  in  which  poetry  has  always  sought 
its  golden  age.  It  is  a  region  of  homely  shepherds  and  their  still 
more  clownish  sons  ;  with  storms  when  you  cannot  thrust  a  bodkin's 
point  betwixt  sea  and  sky,  or  sunny  days  in  the  sweet  of  the  year, 
that  set  the  red  blood  in  winter's  pale,  while  the  thrush  and  jay, 
or  lark  with  tirra-lyra  chant,  make  summer  songs.  It  is  a  life  of 
naive  simplicity ;  its  cares  are  to  follow  grumblingly  the  scared 
sheep,  when  some  "  boiled  brains  of  nineteen  and  two-and-twenty  " 
insist  on  hunting  in  bad  weather ;  or  to  cast  up  items  of  groceries 
for  the  feast,  not  without  the  aid  of  counters.  For  great  events 
we  hear  of  sheep-shearing  times  and  their  busy  hospitaHty :  with 
the  old  wife  as  both  dame  and  servant,  welcoming  all,  serving  all, 
"  her  face  o'  fire  with  labour  and  the  thing  she  took  to  quench  it  "  ; 


72  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

with  Mopsa  and  Dorcas  dancing,  or  watching  the  galHmaufry  of 
gambols  some  newly  come  Satyrs  are  exhibiting,  one  of  whom,  by 
his  own  report,  has  danced  before  the  King,  while  the  worst 
"  jumps  twelve  foot  and  a  half  by  the  squier  " ;  with  disguised 
royalties  invited  in  as  passers-by,  and  listening  to  the  songs,  or  the 
catches  of  the  three-man  song-men,  or  the  puritan  singing  psalms 
to  hornpipes.  The  poetry  of  this  life  is  the  language  of  flowers : 
how  for  the  reverend  visitors  there  are  rosemary  and  rue,  which 
keep  seeming  and  savour  all  the  winter  long ;  how  for  middle  life 
there  are  summer  growths  of  hot  lavender,  mints,  savory,  marjoram, 
and  marigold  that  goes  to  bed  with  the  sun  and  with  him  rises 
weeping;  how  spring  and  youth  have  their  own  daffodils,  that 
come  before  the  swallow  dares  and  take  the  winds  of  March 
with  beauty,  or  dim  violets,  or  pale  primroses  that  maid-hke  die 
unmarried ;  the  old  poetic  feud  of  natural  and  artificial  makes  its 
appearance,  and  critic  Perdita  rules  out  the  carnations  and  pied 
gillyvors  as  nature's  bastards.^  So  too  the  rustic  world  has  its 
own  type  of  the  marvellous  —  marvels  of  ballads  :  one  to  a  very 
doleful  tune,  how  a  usurer's  wife  was  brought  to  bed  of  twenty 
money-bags  at  a  burthen ;  another  ballad  of  a  fish  that  appeared 
forty  thousand  fathom  above  water,  and  sang  against  the  hard 
hearts  of  maids  : 

Dorcas.         Is  it  true  too,  think  you  ? 

Autolycus.     Five  justices'  hands  at  it,  and  witnesses  more  than  my 
pack  will  hold. 

If  commerce  is  to  appear  at  all  in  this  idylHc  life,  it  must  come 

dancing  in. 

Lawn  as  white  as  driven  snow ; 
Cyprus  black  as  e'er  was  crow ; 
Gloves  as  sweet  as  damask  roses ; 
Masks  for  faces  and  for  noses ; 
Bugle  bracelet,  necklace  amber ; 
Perfume  for  a  lady's  chamber ; 

1  Compare  the  whole  passage  (IV.  iv.  79-103),  as  a  most  important  pronounce- 
ment on  critical  questions  in  an  unexpected  context. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  73 

Golden  quoifs  and  stomachers, 

For  my  lads  to  give  their  dears  ; 

Pins  and  poking-sticks  of  steel, 

What  maids  lack  from  head  to  heel : 

Come,  buy  of  me,  come ;  come  buy,,  come  buy. 

Even  evil,  the  inseparable  attendant  of  human  life,  is  seen  in  a 
softened  form.  It  has  flown  over  many  knavish  professions  and 
settled  into  '  roguery ' :  the  word  is  used  in  the  spirit  in  which  it 
is  apphed  to  the  nursery,  and  the  name  of  the  rogue  Autolycus 
takes  us  back  to  Homer,  to  the  primeval  simpHcity  that  saw  a  god 
in  Mercury,  snapper-up  of  unconsidered  trifles.  This  Autolycus  is 
no  highwayman  in  dread  of  the  gallows ;  his  revenue  is  the  silly 
cheat,  and  for  the  life  to  come  he  sleeps  out  the  thought  of  it.  His 
dehcacy  refuses  offered  charity  from  the  passer-by  who  has  come 
to  his  rescue,  and,  weeping  thanks,  he  leans  on  his  shoulder  to 
pick  his  pocket,  and  warn  him  against  one  Autolycus.^  His  merry 
frauds  make  Honesty  a  fool,  and  Trust,  his  sworn  brother,  a  very 
simple  gentleman :  ^  under  the  spell  of  pastoral  poetry  they  come 
to  us  as  no  more  than  the  necessary  shading  for  the  bright  picture 
of  contented  simplicity. 

Jog  on,  jog  on,  the  foot-path  way, 

And  merrily  hent  the  stile-a : 
A  merry  heart  goes  all  the  day, 

Your  sad  tires  in  a  mile-a. 

In  these  surroundings  of  rustic  simplicity,  the  healing  peace  of 
nature  for  the  distractions  of  social  life,  events  are  slowly  preparing 
the  restoration  which  is  to  crown  the  plot.  The  foundling  grows 
into  the  lovely  Perdita,  a  shepherdess  in  outward  guise,  while  her 
foster  father  —  mysteriously  to  the  neighbours  —  is  grown  from 
very  nothing  to  an  unspeakable  estate.  The  presence  of  Perdita 
transforms  a  sheep-shearing  feast  into  an  assembly  of  petty  gods, 
herself  a  Flora,  peering  in  April's  front.  So  thinks  the  son  of 
Polixenes :  for  the  time-honoured  machinery  of  a  falcon's  flight  ^ 

1  IV.  iii,  from  31.  2  iv.  iv.  606.  8  iv.  iv.  14. 


74  THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

across  her  father's  ground  has  brought  the  shepherd  maiden  a 
prince  for  a  lover,  and  in  the  midst  of  lowly  hfe  he  has  found  his 

perfection. 

What  you  do 
Still  betters  what  is  done.     When  you  speak,  sweet, 
rid  have  you  do  it  ever :  when  you  sing, 
rid  have  you  buy  and  sell  so,  so  give  alms. 
Pray  so  ;  and,  for  the  ordering  your  affairs. 
To  sing  them  too  :  when  you  dance,  I  wish  you 
A  wave  o'  the  sea,  that  you  might  ever  do 
Nothing  but  that ;  move  still,  still  so, 
And  own  no  other  function :  each  your  doing, 
So  singular  in  each  particular, 
Crowns  what  you  are  doing  in  the  present  deed, 
That  all  your  acts  are  queens.^ 

The  obscuring  his  princely  highness  in  a  swain's  wearing  carries 
back  the  thoughts  of  Florizel  to  the  old  world,  which  was  ruled  by 
gods  that  scrupled  not  at  lower  transformations  to  win  a  beauty  no 
rarer  than  his  love.  Nay,  the  providence  of  the  present  seems  an 
accomplice  in  the  innocent  intrigue,  as  we  mark  the  pleasant  irony  ^ 
by  which  the  prince  takes  the  hand  of  the  disguised  visitor,  to 
make  him  a  reverend  witness  of  the  vows  he  pours  forth,  the  un- 
conscious son  protesting  in  his  father's  ear  that  he  will  wait  for  no 
father's  consent  to  so  precious  an  alliance.  The  explosion  of 
royal  wrath  comes  as  a  harmless  thunder,  terrifying  only  the  aston- 
ished shepherds  and  clowns,  while  roguery  delights  to  mock  them 
from  horror  to  horror.^ 

The  curses  [that  shepherd]  shall  have,  the  tortures  he  shall 
feel,  will  break  the  back  of  man,  the  heart  of  monster.  .  .  . 
Those  that  are  germane  to  him,  though  removed  fifty  times, 
shall  all  come  under  the  hangman.  ...  He  has  a  son,  who 
shall  be  flayed  alive ;  then  'nointed  over  with  honey,  set  on 
the  head  of  a  wasp's  nest;  then  stand  till  he  be  three 
quarters  and  a  dram  dead ;  then  recovered  again  with  aqua- 

1 IV.  iv.  136.  2  IV.  iv,  from  371.  3  IV.  iv.  431 ;  and  again  from  699. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  75 

vitae  or  some  other  hot  infusion ;  then,  raw  as  he  is,  and  in 
the  hottest  day  prognostication  proclaims,  shall  he  be  set 
against  a  brick-wall,  the  sun  looking  with  a  southward  eye 
upon  him,  where  he  is  to  behold  him  with  flies  blown  to 
death.  But  what  talk  we  of  these  traitorly  rascals,  whose 
miseries  are  to  be  smiled  at,  their  offences  being  so  capital? 

Out  of  this  hubbub  of  rustic  confusion  Camillo  snatches  the  con- 
trivance,^ which  shall  restore  himself  to  his  loved  Sicilia,  and  which, 
pregnant  with  more  of  restoration  than  he  knows,  shall  make  him 
preserver  of  father  as  of  son,  healer  for  Sicilia's  royal  house  as 
well  as  Bohemia's.  The  process  of  disentanglement  gathers  force, 
and  the  roguery  of  the  story  is  drawn  in  to  play  a  part :  though 
he  is  not  naturally  honest,  Autolycus  is  so  sometimes  by  chance.^ 
With  the  flying  lovers  and  the  pursuing  king  the  scene  shifts  again 
back  to  Sicilia.  In  rapid  play  of  incident  each  knot  of  the  en- 
tanglement is  duly  untied ;  each  woe  reheved  gives  space  to  feel 
those  that  are  left ;  passions  of  penitence,  surprise,  joyful  reunion, 
interchange  as  wonder  succeeds  to  wonder.  The  simple  clowns 
in  their  terrible  trouble  become  important  personages  in  court 
excitements;  discomfited  roguery  has  no  worse  penance  than 
to  behave  humbly  to  the  rustic  victims,  who  receive  apologies 

graciously. 

We  must  be  gentle,  now  we  are  gentlemen.  ^ 

At  last  the  movement  of  the  plot  has  gone  the  full  round  of  the 
arch,  and  the  dignity  of  the  opening  scenes  is  paralleled  as  Leontes, 
with  only  the  one  great  woe  of  his  Hfe  unhealed,  kneels  in  peni- 
tence before  the  wondrous  statue,  and  sees  it  descend  and  grow 
before  his  eyes  into  warm  life  and  forgiving  love.  And  if  Paulina 
is  still  left  in  lonely  sorrow  for  her  mate  irremediably  lost,  a  com- 
forter is  at  hand  in  Camillo ;  the  autumn  idyl  that  unites  these 
two  —  the  main  contrivers  of  the  disentanglement  —  is  the  final 
note  in  the  restoration,  and  the  oracle  of  lost  and  found  stands 
complete. 

1 IV.  iv,  from  519.  2  iv.  iv.  637-98 ;  732.  8  y.  ii.  164. 


76  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

We  saw  the  wrong  of  Leontes  as  moral  disease :  in  what 
followed  disease  has  found  healing.  In  the  physiological  world 
healing  is  in  the  main  a  process  of  Nature,  though  time  and  human 
skill  may  assist.  So  here,  we  seemed  to  move  a  step  nearer  to 
Nature  as  we  passed  from  the  specialised  hfe  of  the  court  to 
pastoral  simplicity.  When  the  time  enlarged  to  take  in  a  new 
generation,  and  sombre  pictures  of  middle  hfe  gave  place  to  the 
ever  fresh  wonder  of  young  love,  we  could  realise  how  the  successive 
generations  of  mankind  have  their  part  in  the  heahng  force  of 
Nature,  the  flooding  tide  of  humanity  washing  away  evil  left  by  the 
ebb.  Nor  has  human  aid  been  wanting  to  this  process  of  heaUng, 
skill  and  patience  meeting  in  Camillo  and  Paulina.  But  there  is 
more  than  this.  Poetry  is  not  merely  dramatised  philosophy ;  its 
function  is  to  create,  but  always  such  creations  as  appeal  to  a  spec- 
tator's sympathy.  Fiction  is  crowded  with  sympathetic  pictures 
of  revenge,  of  intrigue,  of  ambitions.  Yet  nothing  in  the  whole 
world  is  more  beautiful  in  itself  than  redemption :  in  this  play 
Shakespeare  does  poetic  service  in  choosing  redemption  for  his 
theme,  and  in  presenting  it  with  just  the  beauty  of  setting  that  is 
harmonious  with  it,  down  to  the  last  touch  of  perfect  balance 
by  which  the  sixfold  loss  so  strangely  culminates  in  a  sixfold 
restoration. 


Turning  to  Cymbeline,  we  find  the  same  interest  of  plot,  with 
the  addition  of  complexity :  tangled  wrong  heje  works  dramati- 
cally to  harmonious  restoration.  The  regular  arch  has  been  used 
to  illustrate  the  movement  of  some  of  Shakespeare's  tragedies, 
where  a  career  seems  to  rise  to  a  central  chmax  and  as  gradually 
dechne ;  for  the  plays  of  this  chapter  the  movement  is  the  arch 
reversed,  and  the  varied  interests  sink  downward  to  a  lowest  depth, 
from  which  they  gradually  rise  to  the  level  of  restoration.  As  in 
Winter's  Tale,  Shakespeare  uses  the  supernatural  light  of  the 
oracle  to  read  into  clearness  the  intricate  workings  of  provi- 
dence. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  7/ 

The  wrong  presented  is  no  longer  a  single  thing,  like  the  jeal- 
ousy of  Leontes,  but  manifold,  and  emanating  from  different  indi- 
viduals. Here,  as  elsewhere,  the  poet's  treatment  suggests  a  scale 
of  graded  wrong,  from  less  to  more.  We  have  Blind  Wrong  :  in- 
jury done  by  one  who  acts  innocently,  according  to  the  best  light 
he  possesses.  Then  we  find  what  may  be  called  Perverse  Wrong  : 
plainly  and  even  grievously  evil,  yet  founded  on  a  perverted  sense 
of  right.  Finally,  we  have  conscious  and  unmitigated  Villany, 
yet  even  here  with  a  difference  between  the  villany  that  is  crafty, 
and  the  crime  that  is  not  less  villanous  than  stupid.  Six  separate 
wrongs,  illustrating  degrees  of  this  moral  scale,  make  the  sixfold 
complication  :  the  different  characters,  by  natural  reaction  and  the 
working  of  events,  pass  down  the  arch  of  movement  and  up  to 
what  is  possible  of  restoration. 

CymbeHne  himself  illustrates  blind  wrong,  alike  in  regard  to 
Belarius  and  to  Posthumus.     Belarius  tells  his  own  story.^ 

My  body^s  markM 
With  Roman  swords,  and  my  report  was  once 
First  with  the  best  of  note :  Cymbeline  loved  me  ; 
And  when  a  soldier  was  the  theme,  my  name 
Was  not  far  off :  .  .  . 

.  .  .  Two  villains  whose  false  oaths  prevailed 
Before  my  perfect  honour,  swore  to  Cymbeline 
I  was  confederate  with  the  Romans ;  so 
Followed  my  banishment. 

Similarly,  in  Posthumus  the  King  banishes  an  innocent  man ;  but 
the  play  enables  us  to  see  the  clever  Queen  manufacturing  the  evi- 
dence which  is  to  deceive  her  husband,  as  part  of  her  elaborate 
plot  to  secure  the  succession  for  her  son.^  It  is  impossible  for  one 
placed  so  high  as  a  King  to  search  out  for  himself  at  first  hand  all 
the  affairs  in  which  he  has  to  judge  ;  he  must  act  on  evidence  sup- 
phed  to  him,  and  CymbeHne  acts  for  the  best.  But  what  is  the 
sequel  ?  At  first  we  see  the  deed  returning  most  remarkably  on 
the  doer ;  the  rebound  of  Cymbeline's  innocent  injuries  robs  him 

1  III.  iii.  55.  2 1,  i.  103 ;  III.  V.  60-5. 


78  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

of  his  two  sons,  and  then  of  his  daughter.  Yet,  as  the  ways  of 
providence  gradually  unfold  and  bring  the  climax,  those  whom  the 
King  has  injured  are  led,  in  the  mere  passion  of  battle,  to  a  miracle 
of  heroism  :  Belarius  and  his  foster  children  are  "  the  old  man  and 
his  sons,"  taken  for  angels,  who  make  a  Thermopylae  of  a  narrow 
lane,  and  turn  Roman  victory  into  defeat ;  while  the  "  fourth  man 
in  a  silly  habit  who  gave  the  affront  with  them  "  was  the  banished 
Posthumus.^  All  unconsciously  to  himself,  without  intention  on 
their  part,  the  innocent  injurer  has  been  delivered  by  his  victims 
in  the  supreme  crisis. 

Analysis  is  more  difficult  when  we  come  to  that  wrong  which  is 
founded  on  a  perversion  of  right.  Three  of  the  trains  of  interest 
making  up  the  plot  of  the  play  must  be  referred  to  this  heading. 
The  first  is  comparatively  easy.  The  story  of  Belarius  is  a  simple 
story  of  retaliation.^ 

O  Cymbeline !  heaven  and  my  conscience  knows 

Thou  didst  unjustly  banish  me :  whereon, 

At  three  and  two  years  old,  I  stole  these  babes, 

Thinking  to  bar  thee  of  succession,  as 

Thou  reft'st  me  of  my  lands.  .  .  . 

Having  received  the  punishment  before 

For  that  which  I  did  then :  beaten  for  loyalty 

Excited  me  to  treason. 

Revenge,  as  all  moralists  will  recognise,  is  merely  the  high  motive 
of  justice  in  distorted  form.  It  is  interesting  to  watch  this  story 
of  retaliation  working  out.  To  speak  of  the  hard  Hfe  of  exile  in 
savage  wilderness  to  which  Belarius  has  doomed  himself  seems  a 
small  point ;  the  real  interest  is  that  not  only  does  the  avenger,  as 
we  have  seen,  rescue  the  object  of  his  vengeance,  but  he  rescues 
him  unwittingly.  It  is  against  his  will  and  striving  that  the  old 
warrior  is  brought  to  the  battle-field,^  where  martial  ardour  over- 
powers him ;  and  the  force  dragging  him  thither  is  the  youthful 
excitement  of  the  stolen  boys,  whom  Belarius  loves  as  his  own,  and 

1  V.  iii,  whole  scene.  8  iv.  iv,  whole  scene. 

/*  III.  iii.  99;  compare  V.  v,  from  336. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  79 

in  whom  the  inborn  nobility  which  he  has  sought  to  obscure  is 
suddenly  asserting  itself. 

The  wrong  of  Posthumus  is  the  commonest  of  moral  perversions  : 
the  false  sense  of  honour  that  dares  not  refuse  a  challenge,  what- 
ever be  the  moral  cost  implied  in  its  acceptance.  It  is  the  per- 
version which  is  the  product  of  social  narrowness  and  artificiality ; 
the  duellist  dreads  the  sentiment  immediately  surrounding  him  in 
the  coterie  that  has  dubbed  itself  "  men  of  honour,"  and  forgets  the 
great  world  with  its  balanced  judgments  and  eternal  principles  of 
right.  At  the  opening  of  the  play  ^  disinterested  courtiers  exhaust 
superlatives  in  their  characterisation  of  Posthumus  as  the  perfect 
man ;  even  lachimo,  in  describing  the  circumstances  of  the  fatal 
dispute,  speaks  a  like  language. 

The  good  Posthumus, — 
What  should  I  say  ?  he  was  too  good  to  be 
Where  ill  men  were ;  and  was  the  best  of  all 
Amongst  the  rarest  of  good  ones,  —  sitting  sadly. 
Hearing  us  praise  our  loves  of  Italy.  .  .  .     This  Posthumus 
Most  like  a  noble  lord  in  love  and  one 
That  had  a  royal  lover,  took  his  hint. 
And,  not  dispraising  whom  we  praised,  —  therein 
He  was  as  calm  as  virtue — he  began 
His  mistress'  picture. ^ 

Up  to  this  point  Posthumus  is  innocent,  and  moreover  has  depth 
of  nature  to  appreciate  the  perfection  and  purity  of  Imogen.  But 
when  the  challenge  is  made  that  even  this  purity  may  be  conquered, 
Posthumus  surrenders  to  the  lower  standard  of  morals  around  him, 
where  virtue  can  be  made  a  thing  of  wager  and  there  is  not  capac- 
ity deep  enough  to  take  in  perfection.  In  such  an  atmosphere, 
zeal  to  demonstrate  to  the  world  his  wife's  purity,  and  then  punish 
with  the  sword  the  self-confessed  slanderer,  blinds  Posthumus  to 
the  crime  he  is  committing  :  that  to  the  loyal  wife  who  implicitly 
trusts  him  he  is  commending  as  his  noble  and  valued  friend  the 
man  who  comes  expressly  to  assail  her.^    The  evil  thus  started 

1 1,  i.  17,  etc.  2  V.  V.  157.  8  Compare  the  letter:  I.  vi.  22. 


So  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

on  its  downward  career  we  can  watch  round  its  circle  of  movement. 
When  the  false  story  is  told  to  Posthumus,  his  unnaturally  inflated 
confidence  undergoes  sudden  collapse  ;  while  impartial  bystanders 
cry  for  more  evidence,  the  one  most  concerned  leaps  to  belief, 
and  with  passionate  paradox  embraces  the  vilest  conceptions  of 
womankind  and  sexual  honour.^  He  soon  descends  to  lower  crime, 
and  despatches  to  his  servant  Pisanio  the  letter  that  is  subornation 
to  murder.  This  murder  being  supposed  to  be  accomplished, 
in  the  latter  half  of  the  action  Posthumus  is  seen  the  prey  of  bitter 
remorse.  While  he  still  credits  the  false  news,  he  feels  that  Imogen 
is  even  yet  better  than  himself.^ 

Gods  !  if  you 
Should  have  ta'en  vengeance  on  my  faults,  I  never 
Had  lived  to  put  on  this  :  so  had  you  saved 
The  noble  Imogen  to  repent,  and  struck 
Me,  wretch  more  worth  your  vengeance.     But,  alack, 
You  snatch  some  hence  for  little  faults ;  that's  love, 
To  have  them  fall  no  more  :  you  some  permit 
To  second  ills  with  ills,  each  elder  worse. 

The  remorse  expresses  itself  in  action :  Posthumus  has  been 
brought  with  the  nobles  of  his  exiled  home  to  the  invasion  of 
Britain ;  he  changes  his  appearance  with  the  disguise  of  a  Briton 
peasant,  that  he  may  at  least  find  his  death  fighting  on  the  side  of 
Imogen's  people.^  As  we  have  seen,  instead  of  death  he  is  led  to 
prodigies  of  valour  which  save  Imogen's  country  and  father. 
Posthumus  cannot  yet  forgive  himself;  he  puts  on  the  guise  of  a 
Roman  again,  courting  capture  and  death.'*  Imprisoned,  he  has 
leisure  for  further  remorse  :  * 

Most  welcome,  bondage  !  for  thou  art  a  way, 

I  think,  to  liberty  ...  my  conscience,  thou  art  fetterM 

More  than  my  shanks  and  wrists  :  you  good  gods,  give 

The  penitent  instrument  to  pick  that  bolt, 

Then,  free  for  ever  ! 

1  II.  iv,  whole  scene,  especially  113,  130;  II.  v. 

av.i.  8V.i.2i.  4v.iii.75.  6V.  iv. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  8 1 

From  expectation  of  immediate  execution  Posthumus  passes  into 
the  scene  of  the  denouement  ;^  with  its  continued  shiftings  the 
various  sides  of  the  story  are  in  his  hearing  made  clear;   until 

—  as  if  it  were  a  single  stroke  symbolising  the  plot  as  a  whole 

—  Posthumus,  by  a  petulant  blow  struck  at  the  page  who  is 
the  disguised  Imogen/  shatters  the  complex  entanglement,  and 
brings  the  discovery  in  which  the  whole  confusion  is  harmo- 
nised. 

Of  lachimo  the  wrong  would  seem  too  foul  to  find  any  pallia- 
tion. Yet  even  here,  in  the  first  inception,  we  can  see  perversion 
of  right.  There  is  a  sort  of  spurious  zeal  for  truth  in  the  scepti- 
cism that  sets  itself  against  enthusiastic  faith,  and  seeks  by  some 
test  of  fact  to  convict  it  as  pretentious  boasting.  But  such  scepti- 
cism easily  passes  into  a  cynical  antagonism  to  the  ideal  itself; 
and  so  it  is  in  the  present  case.^ 

I  make  my  wager  rather  against  your  confidence  than  her 
reputation;  and,  to  bar  your  offence  herein  too,  I  durst 
attempt  it  against  any  lady  in  the  world. 

In  such  a  spirit  as  this  lachimo  opens  his  *  intrigue  against 
Imogen.  In  a  moment  there  comes  a  sudden  reaction :  ^  in  the 
shame  of  repulse  from  a  purity  he  had  not  had  capacity  to  imagine 
lachimo  is  carried  from  cynicism  to  the  passion  of  revenge.  His 
device  for  procuring  the  secrets  of  the  bedchamber  is  revenge  as 
against  Imogen  :  but  what  is  it  in  reference  to  Posthumus  ?  There 
is  honour  among  thieves,  and  the  idlest  man  of  pleasure  has  a  vir- 
tuous horror  of  cheating  at  cards;  judged  by  his  own  shallow 
standards  lachimo  is  descending  to  the  deepest  depth  when  he 
manufactures  false  evidence  with  which  to  win  a  wager  he  has 
lost.  The  after  part  of  the  play  exhibits  lachimo  covered  with 
shame  ;  and  shame  —  to  our  surprise  —  begets  remorse,*  revealing 
a  better  nature  that  had  been  buried  but  not  lost.     Brought  with 

1  V.  iv,  from  152.  3  j,  jy,  whole  scene. 

2  V.  V,  from  227.  4  I.  vi,  from  32. 

5  I.  vi :  compare  156,  180-210;  and  II.  ii,  from  11.  6  y.  ii.  i. 

G 


82  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  other  Roman  nobles  to  the  British  war,  lachimo  in  his  first 
onset  finds  himself  discomfited  by  a  peasant. 

The  heaviness  and  guilt  within  my  bosom 
Takes  off  my  manhood  :  I  have  belied  a  lady, 
The  princess  of  this  country,  and  the  air  on't 
Revengingly  enfeebles  me ;  or  could  this  carl, 
A  very  drudge  of  nature's,  have  subdued  me 
In  my  profession  ? 

He  is  drawn  onward  in  the  tangled  perplexities  of  the  plot, 
until,  at  a  word  of  challenge,  the  cynic  pours  forth  an  enthusiasm 
of  confession,  in  which  the  perfectness  of  the  two  against  whom 
he  has  sinned  is  made  clear  by  the  fulness  of  his  self-humihation.^ 
Besides  blind  wrong  and  perverted  right  the  story  gives  us  vil- 
lany  unrelieved ;  two  types  of  it,  the  crafty  villany  of  the  queen 
and  the  stupid  villany  of  Cloten. 

That  such  a  crafty  devil  as  is  his  mother 
Should  yield  the  world  this  ass  !  a  woman  that 
Bears  all  down  with  her  brain ;  and  this  her  son 
Cannot  take  two  from  twenty,  for  his  heart, 
And  leave  eighteen. ^ 

There  is  no  need  to  dwell  upon  the  crimes  of  poison  and  slander 
by  which  the  queen  is  intriguing  to  make  a  way  for  her  son  Cloten 
to  the  crown ;  she  becomes  dramatically  interesting  by  her  rela- 
tion to  the  reaction  of  the  plot.  After  all  the  intrigues  have  pros- 
pered, at  the  very  last  all  is  lost  through  the  mysterious  absence 
of  him  for  whose  sake  the  crimes  were  perpetrated ;  ^  under  the 
strain  of  this  mocking  fate  villany  turns  against  itself.* 

Cymbeline.  How  ended  she? 

Cornelius.    With  horror,  madly  dying,  like  her  life ; 

Which,  being  cruel  to  the  world,  concluded 

Most  cruel  to  herself. 

1  V.  V,  from  141,  8  IV.  iii.  2-9. 

3  II.  i.  57,  4  V.  V.  23-68  and  244-60. 


WRONG  AND  RESTORATION  83 

The  long  train  of  crimes  confessed  by  the  queen  follows,  and  the 
doctor  concludes : 

Cornelius.    But,  failing  of  her  end  by  his  strange  absence, 
Grew  shameless-desperate  ;  open'd,  in  despite 
Of  heaven  and  men,  her  purposes  ;  repented 
The  evils  she  hatched  were  not  effected ;  so 
Despairing  died. 

There  seems  to  me  to  be  a  fine  psychological  touch  in  the  shame- 
less-desperate :  successful  wickedness,  mocked  at  the  last  moment, 
flies  through  petulance  to  suicide ;  the  craft  of  hfelong  conceal- 
ment, impotent  to  hurt,  can  at  least  shock  by  venting  its  own 
shamelessness.  And,  in  the  general  working  out  of  events,  this 
confession  of  guilt  takes  obstacles  out  of  the  way  of  the  growing 
disentanglement.  It  is  the  same  with  Cloten  and  his  gross  pur- 
poses. The  final  stroke  in  his  revenge  is  to  adopt  the  very  dress 
of  Posthumus  with  which  to  assail  and  ruin  Imogen ;  ^  in  the 
strange  turns  of  circumstance  his  headless  trunk  is  recognised  by 
this  dress,^  is  wept  over  and  tenderly  buried  by  Imogen  herself: 
this  pious  office,  done  unconsciously  to  her  intending  destroyer, 
brings  Imogen  in  contact  with  Lucius  and  the  Roman  hosts,  and 
so  draws  her  into  the  current  of  events  which  in  the  end  will  bring 
back  to  her  all  she  has  lost.  In  both  the  threads  of  villany  that 
run  through  the  story,  we  see  the  irony  of  death  making  discom- 
fited villany  a  link  in  the  chain  of  restoration. 

Thus  complex  is  the  plot  of  Cymbeline.  Instead  of  some  simple 
outburst  of  passion,  far-reaching  in  its  consequences,  we  here  have 
varied  types  of  evil,  from  unconscious  injury  to  gross  crime  made 
still  fouler  by  folly.  Six  distinct  personalities  are  centres  of  wrong, 
each  sufficient  for  a  complete  plot :  in  the  providential  working 
of  events  we  see  blind  wrong  blindly  restored ;  retaliation  of  evil 
unconsciously  led  to  retaliation  of  good  for  evil ;  perverted  right 
—  like  diseases  that  must  become  worse  before  they  can  become 
better  —  by  sudden  reaction  growing  to  conscious  wrong,  and  then 

1  III.  V,  from  124.  2  IV.  ii.  308. 


84  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

led  in  the  course  of  nature  and  circumstance  to  suffering  and 
redemption ;  while  that  which  is  too  evil  to  be  itself  restored  is 
overruled  into  a  means  of  restoration  for  others. 

But  in  Shakespeare  symmetry  goes  hand  in  hand  with  com- 
plexity. The  sixfold  wrong  has  a  sixfold  victim :  the  separate 
trains  of  evil  are  drawn  into  a  unity  by  the  way  in  which  they  one 
and  all  strike  at  Imogen.  Through  the  error  of  Cymbehne 
Imogen  has  lost  her  husband,  through  the  retaliation  of  Belarius 
she  has  lost  her  brothers ;  Posthumus's  sin  robs  her  of  her  love, 
and  the  crime  of  lachimo  robs  her  of  her  reputation ;  by  the 
queen  her  life  is  threatened,  and  the  villany  of  Cloten  threatens 
her  honour.  In  the  sequel  all  these  are  saved  or  restored,  and 
Imogen  appears  a  motive  centre  for  the  whole  of  this  many-sided 
plot :  in  her  the  lines  of  complication  meet,^  and  her  sufferings 
are  foremost  among  the  forces  of  resolution. 

The  forces  that  make  for  restoration  in  the  play  of  Cymbeline 
also  appear  sixfold ;  in  fact  they  are  not  different  from  what  we 
may  trace  in  Wintet^s  Tale,  or  in  human  life  as  a  whole,  but  the 
complexity  of  the  plot  presents  them  more  clearly  to  our  analysis. 
We  mark  the  suffering  innocence  of  Hermione  in  the  one  play  and 
Imogen  in  the  other,  wifely  dignity  and  sweetness  maintaining 
loyalty  under  the  bitterest  wrongs ;  not  only  do  these  sufferings 
work  heaHng  remorse  in  the  injurers,  but  we  see  clearly  the  wan- 
derings of  the  outcast  Imogen  make  links  in  the  chain  of  events 
which  is  slowly  bringing  back  happiness.  Suffering  guilt  appears  in 
Leontes,  in  Posthumus  and  lachimo ;  we  have  already  noted  how 
actions  in  which  Posthumus  and  lachimo  are  expressing  remorse 
lead  up  to  changes  of  fortune.  To  suffering  fidelity  is  clearly  com- 
mitted a  ministry  of  restoration  :  Paulina's  bold  stand  saves  her 
queen,  but  loses  for  herself  a  loved  husband ;  Pisanio,  distracted 
between  claims  of  master  and  mistress,  maintains  fidelity  at  the 
cost  of  being  threatened  by  the  poison  of  the  Queen  and  the  sword 
of  Cloten,  and  even  by  the  suspicions  of  Imogen  herself.^     In  both 

1  See  below,  Appendix,  page  351. 

2  I.v.  78;  III.  V.  83;  V.  V.  238. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  85 

plays  is  exhibited  what  may  be  called  honest  intrigue.  Camillo 
twice  contrives  an  underhand  policy;  the  physician  Cornelius 
undermines  the  mining  of  the  royal  poisoner,  supplying  drugs 
which  kill  only  in  appearance  : 

She  is  fool'd 
With  a  most  false  effect ;  and  I  the  truer 
So  to  be  false  with  her.^ 

In  such  cases  the  weapons  of  wrong  are  turned  against  itself,  and 
there  is  conscious  cooperation  with  the  forces  of  restoration. 

Notably  in  this  play  appears  Nature  as  a  healing  force.  In 
Winter's  Tale  we  have  seen  this  conception  developed  to  a 
prominence  that  cast  other  forces  of  restoration  into  the  shade ; 
hke  fresh  air  substituted  for  a  confined  room  came  the  passage,  at 
the  centre  of  the  plot,  fi-om  city  to  country  life.  By  a  similar 
effect,  at  the  exact  centre  of  the  play  of  Cytribeliney  as  first  note  of 
the  change  from  complication  to  resolution,  we  have  the  cave  of 
Belarius  amid  its  Welsh  mountains,  and  the  contrast  between  coun- 
try and  court.^ 

Stoop,  boys :  this  gate 
Instructs  you  how  to  adore  the  heavens,  and  bows  you 
To  a  morning's  holy  office  :  the  gates  of  monarchs 
Are  archM  so  high  that  giants  may  jet  through 
And  keep  their  impious  turbans  on,  without 
Good  morrow  to  the  sun  .  .  . 
Now  for  our  mountain  sport :  up  to  yond  hill ! 
Your  legs  are  young :  I'll  tread  these  flats.    Consider, 
When  you  above  perceive  me  like  a  crow, 
That  it  is  place  which  lessens  and  sets  off: 
And  you  may  then  revolve  what  tales  I  have  told  you 
Of  courts,  of  princes,  of  the  tricks  in  war.  .  .  . 

.  .  .  O,  this  life 
Is  nobler  than  attending  for  a  check, 
Richer  than  doing  nothing  for  a  bauble. 
Prouder  than  rustling  in  unpaid-for  silk. 

1 1.  V.  42.  2111.  Hi. 


86  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

In  all  the  sequel,  though  as  a  single  thread  intertwining  with 
others,  we  find  this  interest  of  open-air  Hfe  maintained ;  side  by 
side  with  scenes  of  camp  and  court  we  get  the  primitive  simplicity 
of  outdoor  life,  the  cave  and  forest,  joys  of  hunting,  rustic  feasts 
and  rural  obsequies ;  the  spirit  of  the  Welsh  mountains  is  seen  to 
mould  the  events  that  are  leading  up  to  the  climax.  Nature 
again  is  seen  in  the  mystic  sympathy  that  draws  the  boys  of  the 
cave  to  the  slim  page  their  guest,  so  that  one  of  them  says  :  ^ 

...  The  bier  at  door, 
And  a  demand  who  is't  shall  die,  I'll  say 
'  My  father,  not  this  youth  '  — 

and  the  supposed  father  must  secretly  recognise  that  the  boy  speaks 
more  naturally  than  he  can  know.  Above  all,  the  force  of  Nature  is 
manifested  in  the  secret  reversion  to  strain  of  the  royal  boys, 
brought  up  in  a  rustic  Hfe  yet  reaching  after  greatness,  their 
princely  nerves  straining  to  act  the  deeds  they  hear  of. 

O  thou  goddess, 
Thou  divine  Nature,  how  thyself  thou  blazon'st 
In  these  two  princely  boys  !     They  are  as  gentle 
As  zephyrs  blowing  below  the  violet, 
Not  wagging  his  sweet  head ;  and  yet  as  rough, 
Their  royal  blood  enchafed,  as  the  rudest  wind, 
That  by  the  top  doth  take  the  mountain  pine 
And  make  him  stoop  to  the  vale.     'Tis  wonder 
That  an  invisible  instinct  should  frame  them 
To  royalty  unlearned,  honour  untaught. 
Civility  not  seen  from  other,  valour 
That  wildly  grows  in  them,  but  yields  a  crop 
As  if  it  had  been  sow'd.^ 

We  have  already  seen  how  it  is  this  boyish  excitement  for  the  war 
that  is  in  the  air,  and  its  chances  for  great  deeds,  which  brings  to 
the  scene  of  the  crisis  the  heroes  who  are  to  revolutionise  the 
course  of  events. 

1  IV.  ii.  22.  2  IV.  ii.  169. 


WRONG  AND   RESTORATION  87 

Suffering  innocence,  suffering  guilt,  suffering  fidelity,  holiest 
intrigue,  the  healing  power  of  Nature  —  these  are  forces  of  resto- 
ration in  the  story  of  Cymbeline ;  a  sixth  that  mingles  with  the 
rest  and  binds  them  together  is  the  force  of  an  overruling  provi- 
dence. We  recognise  a  moral  government  of  the  world  as  we 
note  each  case  of  perverted  right,  as  if  by  natural  law,  work 
through  suffering  to  its  redemption.  There  is  a  suggestion  of 
providence  in  the  strange  irony  by  which  triumphant  villany  falls 
confounded  at  the  last,  and  in  its  fall  becomes  an  instrument  of 
restoration.  Again,  we  may  fasten  our  attention  upon  a  single 
device  of  the  plot,  the  casket  of  poison.  We  see  this  prepared  for 
the  guilty  Queen  by  the  deceiving  physician,^  dropped  by  her  in 
the  path  of  Pisanio,^  given  innocently  by  Pisanio  to  Imogen  as  a 
charm  against  the  weariness  of  her  journey ;  ^  Imogen  eats  from 
it  ^  and  is  taken  for  dead,  is  buried  in  the  grave  of  Cloten,  awakes  ^ 
and  recognises  the  headless  body  as  Posthumus,  procures  its  fitting 
burial  with  the  aid  of  the  soldiers  of  Lucius,^  and  is  thus  brought 
into  the  Roman  host  and  into  the  course  of  events  which  are 
moving  to  the  climax :  as  we  trace  this  single  point  along  the  line 
of  movement  we  see  it  as  a  Hnk  binding  successive  accidents  into 
a  chain  of  providential  design.  The  oracle  was  to  antiquity  the 
revelation  of  providence,  and  two  oracles  illuminate  the  present 
plot :  the  soothsayer's  vision  ^  —  of  the  Roman  eagle  winged  from 
spongy  south  to  west  and  lost  in  the  sunbeams  —  has  the  tra- 
ditional ambiguity,  which  gives  different  interpretations  according 
to  the  prospect  of  events  and  their  issue ;  the  other  oracular 
message  is  seen  at  the  close  to  have  predicted  correctly  with  the 
aid  of  an  etymological  quibble  which  reads  tender  air  as  mollis  a'er, 
so  as  mulierj  so  as  woman?  The  mask  introduced  into  the  play 
of  Cymbeline  is  simply  a  dramatisation  of  providence,  Jove  and 
the  gods  descending  to  read  the  meaning  of  dark  dispensations. 
It  may  be  a  question  how  much  of  this  mask  is  genuine.     But  as 

1 1.  V.  33.  4  IV.  ii.  38.  7  IV.  ii.  346 ;  V.  v.  467. 

2  I.  V.  60,  etc.  6  IV.  ii,  from  291.  8  v.  v,  from  426. 

8  III.  iv.  190.  6  IV.  ii,  from  353. 


SS  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

it  stands  it  unites  with  other  parts  of  the  play  in  that  which,  more 
than  anything  else,  emphasises  the  providence  underlying  the  whole 
plot  —  the  emergence  from  time  to  time  of  great  principles  of 
moral  government.  When  to  Pisanio  the  drift  of  events  is  at  its 
darkest  he  is  made  to  appeal  to  a  higher  power : 

The  heavens  still  must  work. 
And  again, 

All  other  doubts  by  time  let  them  be  clear'd  : 
Fortune  brings  in  some  boats  that  are  not  steer'd.i 

The  deity  of  the  mask  gives  comfort  against  the  "  mortal  acci- 
dents" that  have  befallen  Posthumus  ; 

Whom  best  I  love  I  cross  ;  to  make  my  gift, 

The  more  delayM,  delighted.  .  .  . 

He  shall  be  lord  of  lady  Imogen, 

And  happier  much  by  his  affliction  made.^ 

And  in  the  sorest  strait  to  which  Imogen  is  brought  in  her  wander- 
ings words  are  spoken  to  her  which  may  well  stand  as  foundation 
principle  of  the  whole  plot : 

Some  falls  are  means  the  happier  to  arise.' 

1  IV.  iii.  41,  45.  2  V.  iv.  loi.  »  IV.  ii.  403. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN:   THE  MASK- 
TRAGEDY  OF  HENRY  THE  EIGHTH 

The  play  of  Henry  the  Eighth  stands  unique  among  the  Shake- 
spearean dramas  in  regard  to  its  Hterary  form.  It  is  not  one  of 
the  series  of  histories ;  it  has  no  resemblance  to  comedy ;  the 
term  tragedy  does  not  fully  express  it.  In  exact  classification  it 
is  historic  tragedy  interwoven  with  court  mask.  And  justice  must 
be  done  to  both  the  constituent  elements  before  the  richness  of 
the  poem  can  fully  be  appreciated. 

The  mask  or  pageant  —  I  am  not  aware  that  the  line  of 
demarcation  between  the  two  has  ever  been  drawn  precisely  — 
played  a  much  more  prominent  part  in  Elizabethan  Hfe  than 
would  appear  from  the  traces  left  in  permanent  literature.  The 
terms  cover  a  great  variety  of  productions,  from  the  extemporised 
procession  greeting  a  royal  personage  or  a  returning  hero,  to  the 
exquisite  masks  of  Ben  Jonson,  with  their  complex  structure  —  of 
opening,  disclosure  of  the  music,  disclosure  of  the  maskers,  dances, 
revels,  close,  and  interrupting  antimasks  —  all  the  fine  arts  cooperat- 
ing in  a  single  spectacle.  The  common  element  in  these  various 
kinds  of  composition  is  the  dance  or  procession  of  persons  in 
costume,  the  movement  being  not  less  symbolic  than  the  costume. 
One  further  point  is  essential :  the  mask  or  pageant  is  always  a 
glorification  of  some  personage  or  some  cause ;  either  the  tribute 
is  paid  by  the  general  character  of  the  spectacle,  or  —  as  so  often 
in  Ben  Jonson's  masks  —  a  compliment  is  sprung  upon  us  as  a  sur- 
prise, ingeniously  fitted  into  some  detail  of  the  action.  A  modern 
charade  presents  successive  scenes,  each  embodying  a  syllable  of  a 
particular  word :  to  guess  the  key  word  is  not  more  necessary  to 

89 


90  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  charade  than  to  emphasise  the  compUment  is  essential  to  the 
mask. 

In  this  way  the  play  of  Henry  the  Eighth  is  in  part  a  court  mask, 
paying  honour  to  Queen  Ehzabeth^  through  her  mother  Anne 
Bullen.  Three  out  of  the  five  acts  are  crowned  with  elaborate 
spectacles,  presenting  with  pageantry  and  splendour  successive 
stages  in  the  rise  of  Anne :  her  first  meeting  with  Henry,  her 
coronation  as  queen  of  England,  and  —  what  for  the  immediate 
purpose  must  be  regarded  as  a  still  higher  climax  —  the  christening 
of  her  babe  Elizabeth.  But  at  this  point  a  difficulty  arises.  As  a 
matter  of  common  historic  knowledge,  the  elevation  of  Anne 
Bullen  was  at  the  expense  of  Queen  Katherine,  the  reigning  con- 
sort being  divorced  and  relegated  to  obscurity  in  order  to  make 
way  for  her  maid  of  honour.  Now  Katherine  was  the  mother  of 
the  late  Queen  Mary ;  and  matters  of  this  kind  must  be  delicately 
handled  in  court  spectacles. 

To  meet  this  difficulty  the  author  (or  authors)  of  the  play  have 
fallen  back  upon  an  idea  which  enters  deeply  into  human  life,  and 
is  one  of  the  root  ideas  in  the  moral  system  of  Shakespeare.  It  is 
difficult  to  express  this  conception  by  any  term  not  open  to  objec- 
tion ;  I  am  here  calling  it  the  antithesis  of  the  Outer  and  the  Inner 
life.  The  hfe  without  is  the  common  life,  into  which  each  individual 
enters  with  other  individuals,  having  his  share  in  general  aims  and 
activities ;  it  is  life  in  the  objective.  The  life  within  is  the  subjec- 
tive attitude  to  things  :  each  individual  is  himself  a  microcosm,  all 
that  appears  in  the  universe  is  regarded  from  the  point  of  view  of 
his  own  personaHty.  The  distinction  is  not  simply  that  between 
outer  actions  and  inner  motives ;  of  actions  and  motives  alike  it 
may  be  asked  whether  they  have  their  reference  to  the  common 
world  without  or  to  the  individual  life  within.  To  take  a  simple 
illustration.  We  have  before  us  a  painted  picture,  say,  of  St.  George 
and  the  Dragon ;  we  see  the  figure  of  a  knight  in  armour  riding, 

1  In  the  eulogistic  climax  (V.  v,  from  40)  James  I  is  associated  with  Elizabeth ; 
but  this  savours  of  a  revision  with  a  view  to  performance  during  his  reign  ;  there  is 
no  other  connection  of  the  King  with  the  language  or  structure  of  the  play. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN  9 1 

lance  in  rest,  against  a  monster.  But  the  visible  picture  may  per- 
haps admit  of  more  than  one  interpretation.  St.  George  may  be 
a  simple  warrior,  in  the  ordinary  course  of  a  warrior's  life  facing  a 
danger  that  has  arisen.  Or,  we  may  imagine  that  this  St.  George, 
like  the  hero  of  Scott's  Fair  Maid  of  Perth^  has  been  born  into 
the  ranks  of  chivalry  with  the  physical  constitution  of  a  coward; 
that  by  supreme  moral  resolution  he  has  determined  to  force  him- 
self to  do  all  that  other  warriors  do,  and  he  has  sought  out  the 
dragon  as  a  desperate  danger  that  will  furnish  stern  discipline  for 
his  shrinking  nerves.  The  one  interpretation  makes  the  picture 
an  incident  of  the  world  without,  the  other  an  incident  of  the 
world  within. 

This  conception  of  the  Outer  and  Inner  life  —  or,  as  it  has  some-  ^\ 
times  been  called,  this  antithesis  of  Doing  and  Being  ^  —  has  appli- 
cation all  over  the  field  of  morals.  It  enters  into  the  analysis  of 
individual  character.  One  man  may  be  great  in  doing,  supreme 
in  power  and  resource  as  regards  the  activities  of  external  life, 
while  in  the  sphere  of  being  and  introspective  consciousness  he 
may  show  nothing  but  bewilderment  and  lack  of  insight :  such  is 
Macbeth.  Another,  like  Hamlet,  may  be  at  home  in  self-analysis 
and  all  that  belongs  to  the  roots  of  action,  and  yet  show  only  un- 
certainty and  hesitation  when  he  comes  to  act.  Or  the  distinction 
of  the  two  lives  may  appear  in  another  way.  We  talk  of  success 
and  failure,  of  the  rise  and  fall  of  historical  personages.  But  what 
is  success  in  the  external  life  may  be  failure  in  the  life  within  :  a 
position  of  external  pomp  and  dignity  may  be  obtained  by  a  moral 
sacrifice  which  plunges  the  world  of  being  into  ruin.  Or  to  the 
eyes  of  all  without  there  may  be  a  fall :  the  hfe  within  is  conscious 
of  a  rise  and  an  expansion  in  spiritual  dignity.  It  is  in  the  latter 
form  that  the  application  of  the  antithesis  may  be  made  to  the  play 
of  Henry  the  Eighth.     The  necessities  of  the  story  involve  the  deg- 

1  Compare  an  admirable  discourse  by  James  Martineau  in  his  Endeavours  after 
the  Christian  Life,  page  354.  The  antithesis  is  applied  to  the  play  of  Macbeth  in 
my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dratnatic  Artist,  Chapter  VII ;  compare  also  Chapter  VIU 
of  the  same  work. 


92  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

radation  of  Queen  Katherine;  historic  fact  makes  it  possible  to 
present  this  as  a  fall  only  in  the  outer  life,  while  in  the  life  within 
there  is  elevation  and  rising  dignity.  Thus  to  the  pageants  pre- 
senting the  career  of  Anne  Bullen  there  are  added  two  of  which 
Katherine  is  the  centre  ;  the  one  displays  the  deposition  of  a  queen 
from  her  splendid  station,  the  other  is  a  vision  of  angels,  betoken- 
ing with  spiritual  splendour  the  elevation  of  Katherine  as  a  saint. 

The  elements  of  the  play,  so  far  as  it  is  a  mask,  are  now  com- 
plete. What  the  reader  of  Henry  the  Eighth  may  easily  under- 
estimate, while  he  is  merely  reading,  gains  its  full  proportion  to 
the  whole  when  adequate  stage  setting  makes  appeal  to  the  eye. 
Each  of  the  five  acts  culminates  in  some  pageant ;  ^  the  three  acts 
visibly  presenting  steps  in  the  rise  of  Anne  —  the  first  meeting,  the 
coronation,  the  christening  —  are  separated  by  the  two  in  which 
spectacular  effect  suggests  the  fall  of  Katherine,  a  fall  which  is  the 
elevation  of  a  saint.^ 

The  first  act  ends  with  the  revels  of  York  Place.^  We  have  a 
brief  glimpse  of  court  ladies  and  free-tongued  noblemen  making 
merry  at  the  banquet.  Cardinal  Wolsey  encouraging  them  from 
under  the  canopy  of  state  ;  to  the  sound  of  drums  and  trumpets  a 
troop  of  maskers  interrupt  —  shepherds  from  afar,  who  have  left 
their  flocks  to  gaze  on  English  beauties;  with  the  readiness  of 
court  functions  the  banquet-hall  is  transformed  into  a  ballroom, 
and  the  revels  proceed  gayly ;  at  the  proper  moment  for  the  com- 
pliment the  Cardinal  is  impressed  with  the  thought  that  one  of 
these  maskers  is  more  worthy  than  himself  of  the  seat  of  honour ; 
the  King  unmasks,  banters  the  churchman  at  the  fair  company  he 
keeps,  and  eagerly  inquires  the  name  of  the  lady  with  whose  charms 
he  has  been  smitten  ;  all  resolve  to  make  a  night  of  it.  The  whole 
design  of  the  festivity  has  been  to  bring  together  the  King  and  the 
lowly  beauty  who  has  just  come  to  court.  In  the  second  act  pomp 
and  pageantry  are  put  to  the  strangest  of  uses  —  to  adorn  proceed- 

1  The  coronation  pageant,  which  serves  as  crowning  spectacle  to  Act  III,  comes 
at  the  commencement  of  Act  IV. 

2  See  below,  Appendix,  page  369.  8  I.  iv. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN  93 

ings  of  a  divorce  court.^  Bands  of  music  usher  in  processions, 
each  more  dignified  than  the  preceding ;  the  bewildered  eye  must 
take  in  gowned  doctors  acting  as  secretaries,  archbishop  and  at- 
tendant bishops  arranging  themselves  as  in  consistory,  officers  and 
nobles  bearing  aloft  symbols  —  of  purse  and  great  seal  and  cardi- 
nal's hat,  of  silver  cross  to  suggest  the  spiritual,  silver  mace  the 
temporal  functions  of  the  court,  and  silver  pillars  to  symbolise  the 
cardinal  judges  as  pillars  of  the  church ;  nobles  and  personages  of 
the  court  make  up  the  crowd ;  the  scarlet  majesty  of  Rome  sits  to 
judge,  and  for  the  parties  to  the  suit  the  proud  crier  can  summon 
into  court  a  crowned  king  and  queen.  Yet  the  whole  is  under- 
stood to  be  no  more  than  the  spectacular  setting  proper  for  the 
deposition  of  an  innocent  queen  from  her  high  estate.  In  the 
third  act  Anne  has  risen  to  the  throne,  and  this  is  followed  by 
the  pageant  of  coronation,^  for  which  state  ceremony  reserves  its 
supreme  efforts  of  emblematic  spectacle.  We  see  the  procession 
of  ermined  judges,  white-robed  choristers,  musicians ;  Mayor  of 
I^ndon  with  the  quaint  symbols  of  the  city.  Garter  in  his  gilt  cop- 
per crown  and  the  mystic  devices  of  heraldry ;  nobles  with  sceptres 
and  demi-coronals  and  wands  of  office,  each  in  gorgeous  vestments 
reserved  for  this  one  occasion ;  under  a  canopy,  which  is  the  privi- 
lege of  the  Cinque-ports  to  carry,  walks  the  exquisite  Queen  in 
richest  adornments,  bishops  attending,  and  a  proud  duchess  bear- 
ing her  train  :  all  that  the  stage  can  afford  of  pomp  is  concentrated 
on  the  spectacle,  and  when  its  limits  have  been  reached  the  effect 
is  carried  on  by  narrative  describing  the  scene  within  the  abbey. 
In  the  fourth  act  we  have  returned  to  Katherine,  and  pageantry 
becomes  supernatural  vision ;  ^  the  dark  sick  chamber  is  illuminated 
with  mystic  Hght,  and  white-robed  angels  with  faces  of  gold  move 
in  rhythmic  dance  around  the  sleeper,  holding  crowns  of  triumph 
over  her  head,  and  bowing  low  as  they  mutely  proclaim  the  eleva- 
tion of  a  saint  to  heaven.  The  fifth  act  has  for  cHmax  the  christen- 
ing of  the  Queen's  babe.*  But  here,  lest  we  might  tire  with  the 
monotony  of  pomp,  a  variation  is  happily  contrived.  There  is  all 
III.  iv.  21V.  i.  8IV.  ii.  4v.  ivandv. 


94  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

that  is  required  of  sounding  trumpets,  heralds,  civic  functionaries, 
and  marshals,  duchess  godmother  under  canopy  borne  by  four 
nobles,  and  ladies  fiUing  up  the  crowd.  But  the  procession  of 
state  is  threatened  with  being  jostled  out  of  all  order  by  the 
crowds  that  fill  the  palace  yard :  knaves  from  the  kitchen,  red- 
nosed  artisans,  apprentices  from  the  Strand  rallying  to  the  cry  of 
'  clubs,'  files  of  boys  ready  to  shower  pebbles,  and  every  other  type 
of  city  life,  all  pressing  on  till  the  gates  are  giving  way,  and  the 
sweating  porter  with  his  men  see  no  way  to  keep  the  crowd  back 
unless  they  sweep  them  down  with  cannon.  With  this  touch  is 
prettily  suggested  the  overpowering  popularity  of  the  new-born 
Elizabeth. 

But  the  play  is  historic  tragedy  as  well  as  mask :  the  interweav- 
ing of  the  two  constituent  elements  is  a  triumph  of  structural 
skill.  The  effect  of  the  mask  just  described,  we  have  seen,  rests 
upon  the  contrast  of  outer  and  inner  Hfe,  bringing  out  how  that 
which  is  a  fall  in  the  external  world  may  be  a  rise  in  the  sphere 
of  the  spiritual.  The  same  idea  binds  together  the  different  parts 
of  the  tragic  matter.  Four  historical  personages  in  succession  be- 
come centres  of  interest,  and  for  each  there  is  tragedy  in  its  sim- 
plest sense  —  the  fall  from  an  exalted  position.^ 

Think  ye  see 
The  very  persons  of  our  noble  story 
As  they  were  living ;  think  you  see  them  great, 
And  follow'd  with  the  general  throng  and  sweat 
Of  thousand  friends  ;  then  in  a  moment,  see 
How  soon  this  mightiness  meets  misery.  ^ 

But  in  each  case  the  treatment  brings  out  the  contrast  of  external 
world  and  individual  life  ;  in  each  case  we  see,  on  the  one  side  of 
the  turning-point,  external  power  and  splendour ;  on  the  other  side 
a  humiliation,  which  nevertheless  appears  as  exaltation  in  spiritual 
dignity  and  beauty. 
The  first  of  the  four  personages  is  Buckingham.     In  the  open- 

1  See  below,  on  the  meaning  of  tragedy,  pages  187-188. 
a  Prologue,  line  25. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN  95 

ing  scene  Buckingham  appears  in  a  position  of  exalted  rank  and 
social  power  :  he  voices  the  old  nobility  of  England,  scorning  the 
upstart  favourite.  Not  pride  of  birth  alone,  but  supreme  wisdom 
and  unsurpassed  eloquence  have  made  him  "  the  great  duke." 
The  conversation  turns  upon  the  Field  of  the  Cloth  of  Gold,  and 
Buckingham  bitterly  inveighs  against  the  presumptuous  insolence 
that  has  lavished  upon  spectacles  empty  of  results  treasures  dearly 
bought,  and  has  disposed  the  too  servile  nobles  according  to  the 
individual  pleasure  of  a  parvenu.  Where  others  tremble  before 
the  mighty  cardinal,  Buckingham  faces  him  with  disdain  for  dis- 
dain ;  brother  nobles  speak  words  of  caution,  but  Buckingham 
blurts  out  in  plain  language  what  others  think ;  he  will  expose  to 
the  King  what  he  calls  "  a  kind  of  puppy  to  the  old  dam  treason," 
the  way  in  which  the  holy  wolf  or  fox  has  imperilled  the  costly 
French  alliance  in  order  to  intrigue  secretly  with  the  emperor, 
thus  buying  and  selling  the  royal  honour.  But  before  he  can 
move  a  step,  Buckingham  feels  the  hand  of  arrest  on  his  shoul- 
der :  as  the  names  of  accusers  are  spoken  the  whole  secret  plot  is 
visible  to  him  at  a  glance,  and  he  knows  the  end  from  the  beginning. 

I  am  the  shadow  of  poor  Buckingham. 

We  are  to  see  the  ruined  hero  a  second  time^  when  all  is  ac- 
complished. We  hear  described  by  eye-witness  the  scenes  of 
the  trial :  how,  pleading  "  not  guilty,"  Buckingham  alleged  many 
sharp  reasons  to  defeat  the  law  —  in  vain ;  how  he  demanded  to 
be  confronted  with  the  witnesses,  and  found  himself  unable  to  fling 
their  accusations  from  him  ;  how  his  peers  found  him  guilty  of  high 
treason,  and  he  spoke  much  and  learnedly  for  life,  but  all  in  vain. 

When  he  was  brought  again  to  the  bar,  to  hear 
His  knell  rung  out,  his  judgement,  he  was  stirr'd 
With  such  an  agony,  he  sweat  extremely, 
And  something  spoke  in  choler,  ill,  and  hasty : 
But  he  fell  to  himself  again,  and  sweetly 
In  all  the  rest  show'd  a  most  noble  patience. 

1 II.  i. 


96  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

It  is  the  last  two  lines  that  convey  the  crisis  of  the  incident :  in 
the  shock  of  ruin  a  character  emerges,  as  if  from  under  eclipse, 
a  character  of  patient  dignity,  fairness  to  foes  and  tenderness  to 
friends.  The  fallen  nobleman  is  seen  in  the  procession  of  death, 
the  axe's  edge  turned  towards  him. 

All  good  people, 
You  that  have  thus  far  come  to  pity  me, 
Hear  what  I  say,  and  then  go  home  and  lose  me. 
I  have  this  day  received  a  traitor's  judgement. 
And  by  that  name  must  die :  yet,  heaven  bear  witness, 
And  if  I  have  a  conscience,  let  it  sink  me. 
Even  as  the  axe  falls,  if  I  be  not  faithful ! 
The  law  I  bear  no  malice  for  my  death  ; 
'T  has  done,  upon  the  premises,  but  justice : 
But  those  that  sought  it  I  could  wish  more  Christians. 

We  have  the  calm  rectitude  that  will  be  just  to  itself,  but  no  less 
just  to  its  foes.  No  false  humility  shall  sue  for  the  king's  mercy, 
yet  injury  has  no  effect  upon  loyalty. 

My  vows  and  prayers 
Yet  are  the  king's,  and,  till  my  soul  forsake, 
Shall  cry  for  blessings  on  him  :  may  he  live 
Longer  than  I  have  time  to  tell  his  years  ! 
Ever  beloved  and  loving  may  his  rule  be  ! 
And  when  old  time  shall  lead  him  to  his  end, 
Goodness  and  he  fill  up  one  monument  ! 

The  victim  feels  an  exaltation  beyond  that   of  his   triumphant 

enemies. 

Yet  I  am  richer  than  my  base  accusers. 

That  never  knew  what  truth  meant :  I  now  seal  it ; 

And  with  that  blood  will  make  'em  one  day  groan  for't. 

Yet  Buckingham  is  no  stoic,  dying  in  stern  independence :  the 
tenderness  that  is  in  him  yearns  for  supporting  friendship. 

You  few  that  loved  me, 
And  dare  be  bold  to  weep  for  Buckingham, 
His  noble  friends  and  fellows,  whom  to  leave 


THE  LIFE   WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN  97 

Is  only  bitter  to  him,  only  dying, 
Go  with  me,  like  good  angels,  to  my  end ; 
And,  as  the  long  divorce  of  steel  falls  on  me, 
Make  of  your  prayers  one  sweet  sacrifice, 
And  lift  my  soul  to  heaven. 

As  we  view  the  scene  we  forget  to  moralise  about  arbitrary  tyranny 

and  resistance  to  oppression  :  what  engrosses  us  is  a  transforming 

revolution  in  a  great  personality. 

The  second  of  the  four  centres  of  interest  is  Queen  Katherine. 

Her  name  has  become  forever  associated  with  spotless  wifehood 

and  injured  dignity.     Yet  in  the  earlier  scenes  she  appears  before 

us  in  a  position  of  lofty  exaltation  and  external  power.     When  she 

enters  the  council  chamber  as  a  suitor,^  the  King,  secretly  conscious 

of  failing  faith,  raises  her  from  her  knees  with  what  is  more  than 

ceremony. 

Half  your  suit 

Never  name  to  us ;  you  have  half  our  power : 

The  other  moiety,  ere  you  ask,  is  given ; 

Repeat  your  will  and  take  it. 

Katherine  is  a  mouthpiece  for  the  oppression  of  the  people 
caused  by  the  Cardinal's  exactions,  under  which  the  back  is  sacrifice 
to  the  load,  and  cold  hearts  freeze  allegiance  :  Henry  is  indignant, 
and  then  and  there  the  Cardinal  is  ordered  to  recall  his  unlawful 
act.  Still  more  impressive  appears  the  lofty  position  of  Katherine 
in  the  incident  of  the  divorce  court.^  The  whole  power  of  the 
kingdom,  in  alliance  with  Rome  that  claims  kingship  over  kings, 
is  concentrated  upon  an  attempt  to  undo  her.  Where  her  part  in 
the  programme  begins,  she  thrusts  aside  the  role  assigned  her,  and 
kneehng  before  the  King  and  the  husband  speaks  the  language 
of  simple  directness,  urges  the  plea  of  spotless  reputation  and  con- 
jugal bliss  blessed  by  offspring,  appeals  to  the  famous  king-craft 
that  contrived  the  alliance  :  the  fickle  Henry  for  a  moment  is  en- 
tirely won.  The  Cardinal  in  alarm  interposing,  she  turns  upon 
him  with  untempered  indignation. 

U.  ii.  « II.  hr. 


98  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

I  do  believe, 
Induced  by  potent  circumstances,  that 
You  are  mine  enemy,  and  make  my  challenge 
You  shall  not  be  my  judge :  for  it  is  you 
Have  blown  this  coal  betwixt  my  lord  and  me : 
Which  God's  dew  quench !     Therefore  I  say  again, 
I  utterly  abhor,  yea,  from  my  soul 
Refuse  you  for  my  judge ;  .  .  •  and  here 
Before  you  all  appeal  unto  the  Pope. 

Katherine  sweeps  with  dignity  out  of  the  court,  and  refuses  to 
return :  in  a  single  moment  the  elaborate  plot  has  fallen  discon- 
certed. 

This  is  the  highest  point  of  exaltation  for  Katherine ;  her 
humiliation  is  not  a  sudden  catastrophe,  but  rather  a  slow  thrust- 
ing down  step  by  step.^  Like  some  noble  thing  standing  at  bay, 
the  Queen  is  driven  from  point  to  point  by  irresistible  force. 
Advanced  in  life,  with  faded  beauty,  all  the  fellowship  she  can 
hold  with  the  King  being  her  obedience,  how  can  she  prevail 
against  a  passion  excited  by  a  youthful  beauty?  how  can  one 
woman's  wit  stand  against  consummate  craft  acting  upon  a  royal 
power  longing  to  be  convinced  ?  Katherine  can  but  wrap  herself 
in  her  virtue,  fold  after  fold,  as  she  withdraws  herself  into  the 
depths  of  the  inner  Ufe.  To  the  last  there  is  no  compromising  the 
queenly  dignity  she  claims  by  sacred  right  of  marriage ;  ^  she  does 
not  cease  to  unmask  the  "  cardinal  vices  "  that  would  hypocritically 
pass  for  "  cardinal  virtues."  ^     But  she  is  alone  against  a  world. 

Shipwreck'd  upon  a  kingdom,  where  no  pity. 
No  friends,  no  hope ;  no  kindred  weep  for  me ; 
Almost  no  grave  allowed  me :  like  the  lily, 
That  once  was  mistress  of  the  field  and  flourish'd, 
I'll  hang  my  head  and  perish.* 

She  subdues  herself  to  counsel  with  her  foes ;  *  she  invokes  the 
old  love  to  seek  protection  for  the  fortunes  of  her  child  and  her 

1  Compare  IIL  i,  and  IV.  11.  *  III.  1.  103. 

2  E.g.  IV.  ii,  from  100.  4  m.  1.  149.  6  III.  i.  i8i. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN  99 

poor  attendants ;  ^  she  welcomes  even  the  faithful  chronicler  recall- 
ing the  forgotten  virtues  of  the  Cardinal  who  has  ruined  her.^  Her 
unstained  self  has  become  the  whole  world  in  which  she  now  lives 

and  moves. 

Good  Griffith, 
Cause  the  musicians  play  me  that  sad  note 
I  named  my  knell,  whilst  I  sit  meditating 
On  that  celestial  harmony  I  go  to. 

But  the  world  within  extends  to  a  region  which  the  stage  can  touch 
only  in  symbol ;  and  in  unearthly  light  of  vision  glory  we  see  the 
discrowned  queen  prepared  for  coronation  beyond  the  grave. 

It  is  however  Wolsey  in  whom  the  interest  of  the  history  mainly 
centres.  There  is  no  need  to  dwell  upon  the  unparalleled  exalta- 
tion and  power  of  the  famous  Cardinal  during  the  first  half  of  the 
story :  how  the  commons  groan  under  his  exactions ;  the  nobles 
hate  yet  dare  not  speak,  or  if  they  resist  are  crushed  ;  how  France 
and  Spain  bid  against  one  another  for  the  influence  of  the  minister, 
and  are  both  used  to  make  capital  for  his  own  private  designs  upon 
the  papacy.  In  the  change  of  fortune  that  comes  at  the  height 
of  Wolsey's  greatness  both  nemesis  and  accident  concur.  The 
scruples  of  conscience  about  the  legality  of  the  marriage  with 
Katherine  are  of  course  only  the  cover  to  the  real  bait  with  which 
the  Cardinal  is  angling  for  the  King. 

Cha7nberlain.   It  seems  the  marriage  with  his  brother's  wife 

Has  crept  too  near  his  conscience. 
Suffolk.  No,  his  conscience 

Has  crept  too  near  another  lady.* 

The  churchman  and  cardinal  is  using  the  beauty  of  a  young  girl  to 
turn  the  King's  thoughts  from  an  elderly  wife,  and  dispose  him  to  a 
second  marriage ;  Wolsey  will  have  the  chance  of  negotiating  with 
some  great  power  for  a  royal  alliance,  and  will  know  how  to  snatch 
his  own  advantage  out  of  diplomatic  bargaining."*    But  the  engineer 

1 IV.  ii,  from  127.  «  II.  ii.  17. 

2  IV.  ii.  69.  4  III.  ii.  85-90,  94-104. 


lOO  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

is  hoist  with  his  own  petard  :  Henry  is  not  only  smitten  with  Anne's 
beauty,  but  will  marry  herself  and  no  one  else.  Wolsey  has  just 
realised,  in  profound  meditation,  how  his  scheme  has  recoiled  upon 
himself;  lost  in  thought  he  stands  some  time  before  he  is  aware 
of  the  King's  presence ;  he  plunges  into  apologies,  but,  with  the 
famous  frown,  the  King  thrusts  papers  into  his  hand.^ 

Read  o'er  this ; 
And  after,  this  :  and  then  to  breakfast  with 
What  appetite  you  have. 

In  a  moment  Wolsey  seizes  the  situation  :  ^  by  unthinkable  accident 
he  has  handed  to  the  King,  in  a  bundle  of  various  state  papers,  his 
own  private  note  of  his  ill-gotten  wealth,  and  worse  still,  his  plan 
of  counterworking  against  the  King's  darling  project  of  the  divorce. 
For  a  moment  the  fallen  minister  makes  a  fight,^  as  malignant 
courtiers  crowd  around  to  triumph  over  him. 

Surrey.    Now,  if  you  can  blush  and  cry  *  guilty,'  cardinal, 

You'll  show  a  little  honesty. 
Wolsey.  Speak  on.  Sir ; 

I  dare  your  worst  objections :  if  I  blush, 

It  is  to  see  a  nobleman  want  manners. 

But,  left  alone,  Wolsey  realises  that  all  is  over.* 

Farewell,  a  long  farewell,  to  all  my  greatness! 
This  is  the  state  of  man :  to-day  he  puts  forth 
The  tender  leaves  of  hopes  ;  to-morrow  blossoms, 
And  bears  his  blushing  honours  thick  upon  him ; 
The  third  day  comes  a  frost,  a  killing  frost, 
And,  when  he  thinks,  good  easy  man,  full  surely 
His  greatness  is  a-ripening,  nips  his  root, 
And  then  he  falls,  as  I  do.     I  have  ventured, 
Like  little  wanton  boys  that  swim  on  bladders, 
This  many  summers  in  a  sea  of  glory, 
But  far  beyond  my  depth  :  my  high-blown  pride 

1  in.  ii.  85-203.  8  III.  ii.  228-349. 

2III.ii,  from  204.  4III.  ii.  350. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN         lOI 

At  length  broke  under  me  and  now  has  left  me, 
Weary  and  old  with  service,  to  the  mercy 
Of  a  rude  stream,  that  must  for  ever  hide  me. 
Vain  pomp  and  glory  of  this  world,  I  hate  ye : 
I  feel  my  heart  new  open'd.  :  Q,  jipw  wrctfcjiefi' 
Is  that  poor  man  that  bangs  on  princes^  favotirs! 
There  is,  betwixt  that  srnil<j  w<  ^^ouM  ^Sp'^re.to, ,', 
That  sweet  aspect  of  prih'ccs,  and  their  ^Jin,'      ''' 
More  pangs  and  fears  than  wars  on  women  have : 
And  when  he  falls,  he  falls  like  Lucifer, 
Never  to  hope  again. 

I  feel  my  heart  new  opened:  the  shock  of  ruin  that  has  quenched 
for  Wolsey  the  glory  of  external  state  has  rekindled  the  life  within. 

Never  so  truly  happy,  my  good  Cromwell. 

I  know  myself  now ;  and  I  feel  within  me 

A  peace  above  all  earthly  dignities, 

A  still  and  quiet  conscience.     The  king  has  cured  me, 

I  humbly  thank  his  grace ;  and  from  these  shoulders, 

These  ruin'd  pillars,  out  of  pity,  taken 

A  load  would  sink  a  navy,  too  much  honour.^ 

From  servants  weeping  to  leave  so  noble  and  true  a  master,^ from  foes 
seeking  to  do  him  bare  justice,^  we  have  the  other  side  of  Wolsey's 
character,  forgotten  by  men  in  the  glare  of  his  meteor-like  rise  :  how 
from  lowly  birth  he  had  climbed  to  honour,  full  of  sweetness  to  his 
friends,  and  for  his  country  catching  the  new  spiritual  richness  of 
the  times,  and  using  wealth  to  found  those  treasuries  of  wisdom  that 
are  to  make  Christendom  speak  his  virtue  forever.  From  all  this 
he  has  been  diverted  by  the  temptations  of  ambitious  opportunities 
such  as  perhaps  never  came  to  a  subject  before  :  now  he  returns  to 
his  better  self,  and  sees  things  in  their  true  proportions. 

Cromwell,  I  charge  thee,  fling  away  ambition  ; 

By  that  sin  fell  the  angels ;  how  can  man,  then. 

The  image  of  his  Maker,  hope  to  win  by  it? 

Love  thyself  last :  cherish  those  hearts  that  hate  thee ; 

Corruption  wins  not  more  than  honesty. 

1  III.  ii.  377.  2  HI.  ii.  422.  8  IV.  ii. 


I02  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Still  in  thy  right  hand  carry  gentle  peace, 

To  silence  envious  tongues.     Be  just,  and  fear  not : 

Let  all  the  ends  thou  aim'st  at  be  thy  country's. 

Thy  God's,  and  truth's ;  then  if  thou  fall'st,  O  Cromwell, 

ThpMiaJl'st  a  bleSij*eii  -tntirtyr.i 

Men  pour  ch^ap  sarcasiji  od.  the  late  repentance,  that  would  atone 
with  easy  ctntrxtloii  for  the  eyilv/ziicb  has  missed  its  prize.  But 
thus  to  speak  is  to  misread  the  relations  of  the  Outer  and  the 
Inner  life.  In  the  great  life  of  England  Wolsey  is  the  ambitious 
self-seeker  justly  overthrown;  no  words  of  his  can  buy  back  a 
place  for  him,  and  he  knows  his  destiny  to  be  forgotten,  and  "  sleep 
in  dull  cold  marble,  where  no  mention  of  him "  is  to  be  heard. 
But  the  spiritual  world  —  as  the  Parable  of  the  Labourers  teaches 
us  —  has  no  material  divisions  of  time  or  scale  of  retributive 
balance,  no  barrier  against  him  who  enters  at  the  eleventh  hour. 
From  greatness  of  soul  Wolsey  had  been  diverted  by  temporal 
aims  :  to  greatness  of  soul  he  returns. 

His  overthrow  heap'd  happiness  upon  him ; 
For  then,  and  not  till  then,  he  felt  himself. 
And  found  the  blessedness  of  being  little  : 
And,  to  add  greater  honours  to  his  age 
Than  man  could  give  him,  he  died  fearing  God.^ 

Yet  a  fourth  personage  enters  into  the  plot  of  the  play  — 
Cranmer.  Here  the  fall  is  only  threatened ;  the  averting  of  ruin 
has  the  effect  of  reversing  the  usual  order,  and  we  see  Cranmer 
first  patient  in  humiliation,  afterwards  exalted  and  triumphant.^ 
The  reader  must  not  allow  himself  to  be  disturbed  by  any  different 
conception  of  Archbishop  Cranmer  to  which  he  may  have  been 
led  by  his  study  of  history;  undoubtedly  the  Cranmer  of  this  play 
is  the  "  good  old  man,"  the  marvel  of  more  than  human  meekness 
and  forgiveness  of  injuries ;  the  common  voice  says,  "  Do  my 
Lord  of  Canterbury  a  shrewd  turn,  and  he  is  your  friend  forever."  * 
His  part  in  the  matter  of  the  divorce  has  made  the  archbishop 

1  in.  11.  440.  2 IV.  ii.  64.  8  V.  i,  ii,  iii,  v.  *  V.  iii.  177. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN         103 

the  king's  hand  and  tongue.  But  Henry,  swelling  with  con- 
sciousness of  the  divine  right  of  kings  which  was  the  religion  of 
the  age,  is  nevertheless  unconsciously  swayed  to  right  and  left 
by  whatever  influence  gets  his  ear;  the  feud  of  Catholic  and 
Protestant  is  in  an  acute  stage,  and  Gardiner,  successor  to  the 
leadership  of  Wolsey,  holds  Cranmer  an  arch-heretic,  a  pestilence 
infecting  the  land,  a  rank  weed  to  be  rooted  out.  The  King  sends 
for  the  archbishop,^  and  regretfully  explains  the  grievous  com- 
plaints he  has  heard,  putting  as  his  own  thought  what  others  have 
instilled  into  his  mind,  that  so  high-placed  a  personage  as  the 
Archbishop  of  Canterbury  must  be  sent  to  the  Tower  before 
accusers  will  venture  to  come  forward.  To  Henry's  surprise  this 
calls  forth  no  resentment. 

I  humbly  thank  your  highness  ; 
And  am  right  glad  to  catch  this  good  occasion 
Most  thoroughly  to  be  winnow'd,  where  my  chaff 
And  corn  shall  fly  asunder :  for,  I  know, 
There's  none  stands  under  more  calumnious  tongues 
Than  I  myself,  poor  man  .  .  . 
The  good  I  stand  on  is  my  truth  and  honesty : 
If  they  shall  fail,  I,  with  mine  enemies, 
Will  triumph  o'er  my  person  ;  which  I  weigh  not, 
Being  of  those  virtues  vacant. 

In  vain  the  King  dwells  on  the  dangers  that  threaten  his  former 
friend :    Cranmer  understands,   but   protests  innocence,  winning 

Henry  entirely. 

Look,  the  good  man  weeps ! 
He's  honest,  on  mine  honour. 

The  King  gives  the  archbishop  a  signet  ring,  which  in  the  last 
resort  he  may  use  as  token  of  appeal  from  council  to  the  royal 
judgment.  Later  on  we  see  Canterbury  —  in  dignity  the  first 
subject  of  the  land  —  kept  outside  the  door  of  the  council- 
chamber  amid   grooms   and    lackeys  j^    when   admitted,^  he   is 

IV.  i,  from  80.  ay.  ii.  8V.  iii. 


I04  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

denied  his  seat  at  the  council,  and  bitterly  denounced  by  his 
fellow-councillors,  as  a  spreader  of  pernicious  heresies.  The 
accused  maintains  his  unvarying  self-restraint. 

Love  and  meekness,  lord, 
Become  a  churchman  better  than  ambition  : 
Win  straying  souls  with  modesty  again. 
Cast  none  away. 

Only  when  he  is  about  to  be  sent  to  the  Tower  does  Cranmer 
produce  the  ring  and  make  his  appeal.  As  if  he  had  been  listen- 
ing at  the  keyhole  Henry  suddenly  bursts  in  at  the  exact  moment, 
frowning  the  well  known  frown.^ 

Good  man,  sit  down.     Now  let  me  see  the  proudest 
He,  that  dares  most,  but  wag  his  finger  at  thee. 

The  ready  flatteries  of  Gardiner  and  others  are  too  thin  to  hide 
the  offences  of  the  councillors. 

Surrey,   May  it  please  your  grace,  — 

King.  No,  sir,  it  does  not  please  me. 

I  had  thought  I  had  had  men  of  some  understanding 

And  wisdom  of  my  council ;  but  I  find  none. 

Was  it  discretion,  lords,  to  let  this  man, 

This  good  man,  —  few  of  you  deserve  that  title, — 

This  honest  man,  wait  like  a  lousy  footboy 

At  chamber-door  ?  and  one  as  great  as  you  are  ? 

After  being  rated  like  schoolboys  the  lords  of  the  council  are 
compelled  to  embrace  Canterbury  with  hypocritical  fervour.  Then 
Henry  lets  out  the  great  news  —  that  has  had  something  to  do  with 
his  merciful  change  of  mind  —  the  birth  of  a  babe  to  his  lovely 
queen ;  she  is  immediately  to  be  baptized,  and  Canterbury  shall 
stand  godfather.  The  humility  of  Cranmer  shrinks  from  the 
honour,  but  the  King  insists  with  a  good-humoured  jest  — 

Come,  come,  my  lord,  you'ld  spare  your  spoons  ! 

1  V.  iii.  114. 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN         IO5 

So  the  action  passes  on  to  its  crowning  pageant  —  the  christen- 
ing of  the  babe  Elizabeth,  with  Cranmer  as  chief  figure  in  the 
ceremony.  A  yet  higher  point  of  exaltation  is  reached  by  him. 
Old  age  is  prophetic,  and,  the  religious  ceremony  concluded, 
Cranmer  is  seized  with  a  sudden  inspiration,^  beholding  in  vision 
the  greatness  reserved  for  the  babe  just  made  a  Christian :  he 
bursts  into  an  "oracle  of  comfort."     She  shall  be 

A  pattern  to  all  princes  living  with  her, 

And  all  that  shall  succeed :  Saba  was  never 

More  covetous  of  wisdom  and  fair  virtue 

Than  this  pure  soul  shall  be :  all  princely  graces, 

That  mould  up  such  a  mighty  piece  as  this  is, 

With  all  the  virtues  that  attend  the  good, 

Shall  still  be  doubled  on  her :  truth  shall  nurse  her. 

Holy  and  heavenly  thoughts  still  counsel  her : 

She  shall  be  loved  and  fear'd :  her  own  shall  bless  her ; 

Her  foes  shake  like  a  field  of  beaten  corn. 

And  hang  their  heads  with  sorrow  :  good  grows  with  her : 

In  her  days  every  man  shall  eat  in  safety, 

Under  his  own  vine,  what  he  plants,  and  sing 

The  merry  songs  of  peace  to  all  his  neighbours ; 

God  shall  be  truly  known ;  and  those  about  her 

From  her  shall  read  the  perfect  ways  of  honour. 

And  by  those  claim  their  greatness,  not  by  blood. 

Nor  shall  this  peace  sleep  with  her :  but,  as  when 

The  bird  of  wonder  dies,  the  maiden  phcenix, 

Her  ashes  new  create  another  heir 

As  great  in  admiration  as  herself; 

So  shall  she  leave  her  blessedness  to  one. 

When  heaven  shall  call  her  from  this  cloud  of  darkness, 

Who  from  the  sacred  ashes  of  her  honour 

Shall  star-like  rise,  as  great  in  fame  as  she  was, 

And  so  stand  fix'd. 

In  this  long  outpouring  we  have  the  compliment  essential  to  every 
court  pageant,  and  so  the  Mask-Tragedy  of  Henry  the  Eighth  is 
ready  for  the  fall  of  the  curtain. 

1  V.  V,  from  15. 


I06  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARfi 

The  antithesis  of  the  outer  and  the  inner  Ufe,  so  notably  empha- 
sised in  this  play  of  Henry  the  Eighth^  makes  the  last  of  what  I 
am  treating  as  the  root  ideas  in  the  moral  system  of  the  Shake- 
spearean drama.  The  world  created  by  Shakespeare  is  profoundly 
ethical;  no  interest  underlying  it  is  greater  than  the  interest  of 
human  character.  In  some  cases  the  harmony  in  a  single  design 
of  all  that  appears,  which  is  the  plot  of  the  play  and  mirrors  the 
providence  of  the  actual  world,  seems  to  have  for  its  dominant 
purpose  nothing  more  than  the  display  of  some  type  of  character ; 
what  happens  in  Henry  the  Fifth  is  not  a  rise  or  fall  of  the  hero, 
but  serves  to  display  a  perfect  heroism ;  if  there  is  development, 
it  is  the  development  of  the  moon  through  its  phases,  not  varia- 
tion of  the  thing,  but  variation  of  the  light  that  allows  it  to  be 
seen.  Or,  the  field  of  view  extends  to  exhibit  alike  human  char- 
acter and  the  world  of  providential  government  in  which  it  moves. 
In  one  play  the  microcosm  of  providence  is  viewed  on  its  side  of 
retribution ;  the  deed  is  seen  forever  returning  rhythmically  upon 
the  doer,  no  fate  appears  that  has  not  been  forged  by  character. 
In  another  play  the  plot  opens  up  the  strange  work  of  providence 
which  we  call  accident,  the  providence  by  which  character  is  mys- 
teriously denied  its  natural  fate ;  the  emotions  of  the  spectator 
are  turned  into  another  channel  than  retribution,  and  pure  sym- 
pathy finds  its  discipline.  Yet  again,  we  turn  to  behold  the  provi- 
dence of  mercy ;  the  forces  which  make  for  restoration,  alike  in 
character  and  in  fate,  are  displayed  at  their  work,  and  skilful 
fashioning  of  plot  is  permitted  to  clothe  with  beauty  the  lofty 
idea  of  redemption.  But  more  than  all  this  is  required.  There 
are  two  spheres,  not  one,  in  which  providence  may  be  displayed, 
the  life  without  and  the  life  within ;  and  that  which  is  ruin  in  the 
one  may  be  recognised  as  triumph  in  the  other.  This  last  of  the 
root  ideas  of  Shakespeare  seems  to  harmonise  all  the  rest.  In 
the  light  of  this  distinction  between  outer  and  inner  life  there  is  a 
sense  in  which  it  becomes  true  that  the  deed  always  returns  upon 
the  doer :  he  who  has  done  an  unjust  deed  has  so  far  become 
unjust  in  himself,  however  in  the  world  without  his  injustice  may 


THE  LIFE  WITHOUT  AND  THE  LIFE  WITHIN 


107 


bring  him  glory  and  security.  And  though,  in  the  world  of  the 
external,  the  long  career  of  righteousness  has  ended  in  ruin  and 
shame,  it  is  not  the  less  true  that  the  character  has  wrought  out 
its  natural  fate,  for  the  inner  life  knows  the  righteousness  as  itself 
the  highest  prosperity. 


BOOK   II 

SHAKESPEARE'S   WORLD  IN  ITS  MORAL 
COMPLEXITY 

Chapter     VI :  The  Outer  and  Inner  in  Application  to  Roman  Life 
Chapter    VII :  Moral  Problems  Dramatised 
Chapter  VIII :  Comedy  as  Life  in  Equilibrium 
Chapter  .   IX  :  Tragedy  as  Equilibrium  Overthrown 
Chapter       X  :  The  Moral  Significance  of  Humour 


VI 

THE  OUTER  AND  INNER   IN   APPLICATION   TO   ROMAN  LIFE 

We  have  seen  that  among  the  root  ideas  in  the  moral  system  of 
Shakespeare  is  to  be  reckoned  the  antithesis  of  the  outer  and  the 
inner  Hfe,  interest  in  the  common  world  aud  in  the  Ufe  of  person- 
ahty.  In  the  preceding  chapter  we  have  traced  a  very  simple 
appHcation  of  this  idea,  in  a  region  of  human  life  where  the  per- 
sonages affected  do  not  differ  greatly  from  one  another,  nor  from 
us  who  study  them.  If  the  field  of  view  be  extended,  to  take  in 
a  wider  variety  and  greater  complexity  of  humanity,  the  antithesis 
of  inner  and  outer  may  be  expected  to  appear  in  diverse  and  more 
difficult  forms.  I  desire  in  the  present  chapter  to  apply  it  to  the 
Roman  life  of  antiquity,  as  presented  in  the  three  plays  of  Corio- 
lanuSy  Julius  Ccesar^  Antony  and  Cleopatra. 

A  wide  gulf  of  difference,  both  in  thought  and  feeling,  separates 
what  we  call  modern  times  from  antiquity ;  the  difference  is  often 
overlooked,  and,  as  it  appears  to  me,  modern  readers  are  led  into 
serious  misinterpretations  of  ancient  character  and  action.  The 
difficulty  of  the  discussion  is  increased  by  the  fact  that  the  same 
terms  are  applied  to  ancient  and  to  modern  life,  but  the  words  are 
used  in  different  senses.  Thus  in  reference  to  any  age  we  may 
speak  of  subordinating  the  individual  to  the  state.  But  a  modern 
writer  means  by  *  the  state  '  the  sum  of  the  individuals  composing 
it ;  his  subordination  of  the  individual  puts  in  another  form  the 
principle  of  seeking  the  greatest  good  of  the  greatest  number.  An 
ancient  thinker,  on  the  contrary,  might  understand  *  the  state '  as 
an  entity  in  itself:  the  abstract  thing,  government.  We  should 
to-day  assume  as  a  matter  of  course,  that  any  government  must 
exist  in  the  interest  of  the  people  governed ;  the  ancieHv  philoso- 


112  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

pher  might  reverse  the  proposition,  and  tacitly  assume  that  those 
who  were  being  governed  existed  for  the  sake  of  the  government. 
Such  an  attitude  of  mind  is  well  illustrated  in  Plato's  ideal  repub- 
lic, which  abolishes,  not  only  private  property,  but  even  marriage, 
because  children  born  without  family  ties  will  be  more  completely 
at  the  service  of  the  state.  Again,  ancient  and  modern  statesmen 
have  alike  exalted  '  Uberty ' :  but  the  word  is  used  by  the  two  in 
opposite  senses.  With  us,  liberty  means  the  freedom  of  the  indi- 
vidual, so  far  as  may  be,  from  state  control.  In  ancient  politics 
liberty  meant  the  freedom  of  the  state  from  being  controlled  by 
individuals.  An  example  of  the  latter  conception  is  the  Athenian 
institution  of  ostracism,  which  was  not  banishment  inflicted  as  a 
punishment  by  judicial  process,  but  an  authoritative  request  to 
retire  from  the  country;  the  citizen  voting  to  ostracise  Aristides 
*'  because  he  did  not  like  to  hear  him  called  the  Just,"  illustrates 
the  spirit  of  the  institution,  that  the  state  has  a  right  to  be  free  from 
a  personal  influence,  even  when  that  influence  is  wholly  good. 

This  difference  of  political  conceptions  is  part  of  a  wider  differ- 
ence between  ancient  and  modern  thought,  running  on  the  same 
dividing  line  of  the  community  and  the  individual.  A  man  of 
to-day  may  feel  that  he  has  got  down  to  the  bed  rock  of  practical 
philosophy  in  proclaiming  the  rights  of  man ;  to  the  ancient  mind 
the  rights  of  society  were  still  more  fundamental.  Hence  the  ab- 
surdity of  such  visionary  theorising  as  Rousseau's  social  contract : 
in  the  sober  light  of  history  it  appears  that  the  society  which  it  is 
desired  to  explain  was  anterior  to  the  conception  of  individual 
rights  assumed  for  its  origin.  Property,  again,  reflects  the  differ- 
ence between  ancient  and  modern  thinking :  what  seems  so  sim- 
ple to  us,  the  idea  of  a  man's  owning  a  piece  of  land,  was  a  late 
conception  in  ancient  life,  slowly  elaborated  from  the  original  idea 
that  land  belonged  to  the  community.  In  the  field  of  literature 
also  confusion  has  arisen  from  intruding  the  modern  idea  of  indi- 
viduality into  the  social  activities  of  antiquity.  The  modern  mind 
associates  a  particular  '  author '  with  a  particular  piece  of  litera- 
ture, and  protects  by  copyright  laws  the  author's  '  property '  in  what 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  II3 

he  produces ;  it  is  slow  to  grasp  the  totally  different  conditions  of 
oral  poetry,  when  production  was  a  function  of  the  minstrel  order 
as  a  whole,  without  connection  between  individual  poet  and  indi- 
vidual poem  j  when  *  Homer '  would  be  a  name,  not  for  a  man, 
but  for  a  mass  of  floating  ballads,  the  product  of  many  poets 
through  many  generations,  subsequently  worked  up  by  a  single 
mind  into  our  Iliad  or  Odyssey,  Even  in  the  sphere  of  religion 
we  may  trace  the  difference  between  the  earlier  and  the  later  atti- 
tude of  mind.  In  the  religious  development  comprised  within 
the  limits  of  the  Bible  we  see  first  a  national  religion,  God  in 
covenant  with  Israel ;  at  a  much  later  stage  comes  into  promi- 
nence another  conception,  and  Jeremiah  speaks  of  the  new  cove- 
nant written  on  the  hearts  of  individual  worshippers. 

In  these  diverse  conceptions  of  life,  centering  respectively 
around  the  state  and  the  individual,  we  have  the  antithesis  of  the 
life  without  and  the  life  within  reappearing  in  a  different  form. 
In  the  simplicity  of  ancient  life  man  differed  little  from  man,  or 
men  fell  into  well  marked  classes ;  the  earliest  institutions  rested 
on  the  idea  of  these  classifications,  or  of  society  as  a  whole.  But 
with  advancing  civilisation  came  increasing  variation  between  the 
characters  of  different  persons ;  consciousness  of  difference  from 
others  must  give  emphasis  to  the  sense  of  individuality  as  a 
whole ;  quickened  sense  of  individuality  in  a  man's  self  carries 
with  it  sympathy  with  and  insight  into  individuality  in  others. 
Thus  with  the  progress  of  time  individuality  comes  to  assert  itself 
as  a  rival  ideal  to  the  ideal  of  the  state.  This  makes  an  interest- 
ing basis  on  which  to  analyse  the  three  Roman  plays  of  Shake- 
speare :  they  stand  for  us  as  representing  three  different  points 
along  the  line  of  political  evolution,  in  which  the  pure  ideal  of  the 
state  and  the  life  without  is  gradually  yielding  before  the  growing 
prominence  of  the  inner  life  and  the  claims  of  individuals. 

The  play  of  Coriolanus  is  pitched  at  an  early  point  in  the  line 
of  historical  development :  the  only  ideal  here  is  the  ideal  of  the 
state,  the  common  life  to  which  all  actions  must  have  their  refer- 


114  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

ence,  while  the  claims  of  indivjciuality  have  just  begun  to  appear 
as  a  disturbing  force.  Thus  in  relation  to  this  story  the  antithesis 
of  the  outer  and  inner  Hfe  becomes  the  antithesis  between  pure 
political  principle  and  that  concession  to  the  individual  which  we 
call  compromise. 

On  the  surface  of  the  story  we  have  contests  of  parties,  patri- 
cians and  plebeians.  But  these  are  not,  like  the  Whig  and  Tory, 
Democrat  and  Republican,  of  modern  times,  organisations  con- 
tending for  different  plans  of  reaching  a  common  good.  For  both 
patricians  and  plebeians  there  is  but  one  ideal,  that  of  service  to 
the  state ;  and  to  this  ideal  the  patrician  party  is  wholly  devoted, 
as  typified  by  such  leaders  as  Titus  Lartius  —  ready  to  lean  on 
one  crutch  and  fight  the  enemy  with  the  other  ^  —  or  the  incom- 
parable Coriolanus.  It  is  true  that  at  one  excited  point  of  the 
conflict  a  representative  of  the  plebeians  —  as  if  with  a  sudden 
insight  into  the  thought  of  future  ages  —  cries  out^ : 

What  is  the  city  but  the  people  ? 

But  in  the  action  of  the  play  this  comes  only  as  a  wild  extrava- 
gance, and  no  representation  of  the  motives  actually  at  work. 
The  plebeians  as  they  appear  in  this  drama  have  no  ideal  of  their 
own  to  set  up,  but  are  defaulters  to  the  conception  of  duty  recog- 
nised by  all.  They  "  cannot  rule,  nor  ever  will  be  ruled  "  ;  their 
"  affections  are  a  sick  man's  appetite,  who  desires  most  that  which 
would  increase  his  evil."  What  their  scornful  opponents  say  of 
them  harmonises  with  what  their  actions  show  in  the  story,  as  we 
see  the  mob  stealing  away  at  the  first  word  of  war,  and  even  those 
who  are  equal  to  fighting  the  Volscians  diverted  from  valour  by 
the  first  chance  of  petty  spoil.^  This  single  political  virtue  to 
which  part  of  the  people  are  untrue  is  the  very  point  of  the  famous 
Fable  of  the  Belly  and  Members,  with  which  Menenius  strikes  the 
key-note  of  the  whole  play."*  The  belly  and  the  members  are  not 
coordinate  Hmbs  of  the  body;   the  drift  of  the  parable  is  that 

1 1,  i.  246.  8  Compare  III.  i.  40 ;  I.  i.  181 ;  I.  i.  255,  stage  direction ;  I.  v. 

*  III.  i.  199.       *  I.  i,  from  9a. 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  II5 

the  belly  is  the  state,  and  the  members,  so  far  as  they  are  not  serv- 
ing the  belly,  are  disturbers  of  the  general  health  of  the  physical 
or  poHtical  body* 

Men.  Your  most  grave  belly  was  deliberate, 

Not  rash  like  his  accusers,  and  thus  answerd : 

*  True  is  it,  my  incorporate  friends,'  quoth  he, 

*  That  I  receive  the  general  food  at  first, 
Which  you  do  live  upon ;  and  fit  it  is, 
Because  I  am  the  store-house  and  the  shop 
Of  the  whole  body  :  but,  if  you  do  remember, 
I  send  it  through  the  rivers  of  your  blood, 

Even  to  the  court,  the  heart,  to  the  seat  o'  the  brain ; 

And,  through  the  cranks  and  offices  of  man, 

The  strongest  nerves  and  most  inferior  veins 

From  me  receive  that  natural  competency 

Whereby  they  live  :  and  though  that  all  at  once, 

You,  my  good  friends,'  —  this  says  the  belly,  mark  me,  — 

First  at.   Ay,  sir ;  well,  well. 

Men.  '  Though  all  at  once  cannot 

See  what  I  deliver  out  to  each. 
Yet  I  can  make  my  audit  up,  that  all 
From  me  do  back  receive  the  flour  of  all, 
And  leave  me  but  the  bran.'    What  say  you  to't? 

First  at.    It  was  an  answer ;  how  apply  you  this? 

Men.  The  senators  of  Rome  are  this  good  belly, 

And  you  the  mutinous  members  :  for  examine 

Their  counsels  and  their  cares,  digest  things  rightly 

Touching  the  weal  o'  the  common,  you  shall  find 

No  public  benefit  which  you  receive 

But  it  proceeds  or  comes  from  them  to  you 

And  no  way  from  yourselves.     What  do  you  think, 

You,  the  great  toe  of  this  assembly? 

First  at.   I  the  great  toe  I  why  the  great  toe  ? 

Men.  For  that,  being  one  o'  the  lowest,  basest,  poorest, 

Of  this  most  wise  rebellion,  thou  go'st  foremost. 

What  then  is  the  position  of  the  plebeian  party  in  the  conflict  ? 
They  have  no  political  ideal  to  set  up ;  what  they  put  forward  is 


Il6  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

individuality  reduced  to  its  lowest  terms  —  the  bare  right  to  exist. 
It  is  precisely  the  story  of  the  petty  defaulter  and  the  grand  minis- 
ter of  France:  the  defaulter  makes  his  plea,  II  faut  vivre ;  to 
which  the  chancellor  answers  loftily,  Monsieur ^  je  n'en  vols  pas  la 
necessite.     So  the  plebeian  mob  : 

They  said  they  were  an-hungry ;  sigh'd  forth  proverbs, 
That  hunger  broke  stone  walls,  that  dogs  must  eat, 
That  meat  was  made  for  mouths,  that  the  gods  sent  not 
Corn  for  the  rich  men  only.  ^ 

The  claims  of  the  individual  life  are  not  exalted  into  an  ideal ; 
they  have  come  in  as  a  disturbing  force  to  the  common  ideal  of 
the  state  and  its  service.  The  exact  situation  is  that,  at  the  open- 
ing of  the  action,  the  patricians  have  compromised  with  this  dis- 
turbing claim  of  the  individual ;  they  have  ordered  distributions  of 
corn  as  gratuities  and  not  for  service  done ;  ^  worse  than  this,  they 
have  created  tribunes  of  the  people,^  a  perpetual  mouthpiece  for 
popular  claims,  and  thus  a  disturbing  force  to  the  old  single  ideal  of 
the  state  has  been  admitted  within  the  constitution  itself.  Nothing 
but  conflict  can  ensue  ;  and  at  the  height  of  the  conflict  the  speech 
of  Coriolanus  —  continued  amid  interruptions  from  both  sides  *  — 
brings  out  clearly  how  this  is  a  conflict  between  pure  political  princi- 
ple, as  Rome  had  understood  it,  and  compromising  recognition  of 
popular  demands. 

O  good,  but  most  unwise  patricians  !  why. 

You  grave  but  reckless  senators,  have  you  thus 

Given  Hydra  here  to  choose  an  officer. 

That  with  his  peremptory  '  shall,'  being  but 

The  horn  and  noise  o'  the  monster's,  wants  not  spirit 

To  say  he'll  turn  your  current  in  a  ditch. 

And  make  your  channel  his  ?  .  .  .     My  soul  aches 

To  know,  when  two  authorities  are  up, 

Neither  supreme,  how  soon  confusion 

May  enter  Hwixt  the  gap  of  both  and  take 

1 1,  i.  209.  8  I.  i,  219, 

2  III.  i,  from  120.  <  III.  i.  91-171. 


ROMAN  LIFE  DRAMATISED  II 7 

The  one  by  the  other.    .    .   .     They  know  the  corn 

Was  not  our  recompense,  resting  well  assured 

They  ne'er  did  service  for't :  being  pressed  to  the  war, 

Even  when  the  navel  of  the  state  was  touched, 

They  would  not  thread  the  gates.     This  kind  of  service 

Did  not  deserve  corn  gratis :  being  i'  the  war, 

Their  mutinies  and  revolts,  wherein  they  show'd 

Most  valour,  spoke  not  for  them :  the  accusation 

Which  they  have  often  made  against  the  senate. 

All  cause  unborn,  could  never  be  the  motive 

Of  our  so  frank  donation.    Well,  what  then  ? 

How  shall  this  bisson  multitude  digest 

The  senate's  courtesy?    Let  deeds  express 

What's  like  to  be  their  words :  '  We  did  request  it ; 

We  are  the  greater  poll,  and  in  true  fear 

They  gave  us  our  demands.'    Therefore,  beseech  you, — 

You,  that  will  be  less  fearful  than  discreet ; 

That  love  the  fundamental  part  of  state 

More  than  you  doubt  the  change  on't ;  that  prefer 

A  noble  life  before  a  long,  and  wish 

To  jump  a  body  with  a  dangerous  phytic 

That's  sure  of  death  without  it,  —  at  once  pluck  out 

The  multitudinous  tongue ;  let  them  not  lick 

The  sweet  which  is  their  poison.   ...     In  a  rebellion. 

When  what's  not  meet,  but  what  must  be,  was  law, 

Then  were  they  chosen  :  in  a  better  hour, 

Let  what  is  meet  be  said  it  must  be  meet, 

And  throw  their  power  i'  the  dust. 

Around  this  central  idea  of  principle  in  conflict  with  compromise 
the  characters  of  the  drama  naturally  arrange  themselves.  Corio- 
lanus  himself  embodies  absolute  devotion  to  principle,  the  one  ideal 
of  service  to  the  state.  Panegyric  relates  prodigies  of  valour,  mar- 
vels of  self-exposure  against  odds,  which  have  made  Coriolanus  the 
grand  hero  of  the  age.^  Yet  this  is  not  the  fire-eating  battle  passion 
of  a  Hotspur ;  Coriolanus  hates  praise,  and  would  rather  have  his 
wounds  to  heal  again  than  hear  how  he  got  them.^ 

1  E.g.  II.  ii,  from  86.  2  u.  n.  73^  79. 


Il8  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

I  have  done 
As  you  have  done ;  that's  what  I  can :  induced 
As  you  have  been  ;  that's  for  my  country : 
He  that  has  but  effected  his  good  will 
Hath  overta*en  mine  act.^ 

Still  less  can  this  warrior  tolerate  reward* 

He  covets  less 
Than  misery  itself  would  give ;  rewai'ds 
His  deeds  with  doing  them,  and  is  content 
To  spend  the  time  to  end  it.^ 

The  deeds  are  not  actuated  by  personal  ambition  :  Coriolanus  has 
to  be  pushed  forward  by  the  patricians  to  office,  and  "  would  rather 
be  their  servant  in  his  own  way  than  sway  with  them  in  theirs."^ 
From  first  to  last  no  personal  motive  can  be  detected  in  Coriolanus  : 
he  is  actuated  solely  by  the  passion  for  service.  Hence  the  injus- 
tice of  the  common  interpretation,  which  in  this  drama  sees  pride 
and  its  fall.  The  mistake  is  an  easy  one,  for  *  proud  '  is  the  epithet 
for  Coriolanus  that  is  heitd  throughout  the  story,  and  even  in  his 
own  mother's  mouth. 

Thy  valiantness  was  mine,  thou  suck'dst  it  from  me, 
But  owe  thy  pride  thyself.^ 

Moreover,  what  we  see  of  outward  demeanour  in  Coriolanus  is 
just  the  flash  of  scorn  and  mocking  taunt  with  which  pride  ex- 
presses itself.  Yet,  if  we  force  ourselves  to  do  justice  to  this  hero, 
we  must  acquit  him  of  the  charge  of  pride.  Scorn  is  the  expression 
of  righteous  indignation,  as  well  as  of  personal  haughtiness ;  the 
honest  workman,  of  the  type  of  Adam  Bede,  has  nothing  but  scorn 
for  the  feckless  makeshift  throwing  down  his  work  the  moment  the 
bell  rings ;  and  this  on  a  larger  scale  makes  the  magnificent  war- 
rior in  his  attitude  to  the  plebeians  who  claim  feed  and  shirk  duty. 
The  mother  of  Coriolanus,  we  shall  see,  has  an  ideal  different  from 

1 1,  ix.  15.  8  II.  i.  219. 

«  II.  ii.  130.  *  III.  ii.  129. 


ROMAN  LIFE  DRAMATISED 


119 


that  of  her  son ;  moreover,  she  is  infected  with  the  spirit  of  com- 
promise around  her,  and  fails  to  appreciate  the  pure  stand  for 
principle.  Apart  from  this  contempt  for  half  service,  where  is  the 
pride  of  Coriolanus  to  be  found  ?  It  is  not  personal  pride  :  for  this 
hero  of  the  battlefield  cordially  and  without  a  moment's  hesitation 
places  himself  under  command  of  an  inferior ;  his  enemies  the 
tribunes  note  this,  and  wonder  how  "his  insolence  can  brook  to 
be  commanded  under  Cominius."  ^  It  is  not  the  aristocratic  pride 
that  contemns  the  people  as  such  :  this  is  suggested  by  an  incident 
in  which  the  people  can  be  seen  apart  from  the  plebeian  defaulters.^ 

Cor.    The  gods  begin  to  mock  me.     I,  that  now 

Refused  most  princely  gifts,  am  bound  to  beg 

Of  my  lord  general. 
Com.  Take't ;  'tis  yours.    What  is't  ? 

Cor.    I  sometime  lay  here  in  Corioli 

At  a  poor  man's  house  ;  he  used  me  kindly : 

He  cried  to  me ;  I  saw  him  prisoner : 

But  then  Aufidius  was  within  my  view, 

And  wrath  o'erwhelm'd  my  pity :  I  request  you 

To  give  my  poor  host  freedom. 

The  "noble  carelessness"  whether  the  populace  love  or  hate 
him,  the  bitter  contempt  he  pours  out,  are  in  Coriolanus  but  the 
expression  of  the  whole-souled  devotion  to  principle,  as  against 
the  universal  tendency  to  temporise  which  he  sees  around  him.^ 
His  ideal  may  be  the  opposite  of  our  modern  humanity ;  but  jus- 


1 1.  1.  265.  2  I.  ix.  79. 

8  The  nearest  approach  to  aristocratic  contempt  is  the  gibe  (in  II.  iii.  67) :  "  Bid 
them  wash  their  faces  and  keep  their  teeth  clean."  But  this  is  directed,  not  against 
the  people,  but  against  the  insincere  flattery  of  the  people  which  is  being  urged  on 
Coriolanus.  The  conversation  of  the  two  officers  (in  II,  ii)  is  very  much  to  the 
point.  The  first  officer  puts  the  common  view  that  "  to  affect  the  malice  and  dis- 
pleasure of  the  people  is  as  bad  as  ...  to  flatter  them  for  their  love  " ;  the  second 
officer  points  out  that  Coriolanus  does  neither,  but  fixes  his  regards  always  upon 
"the  country,"  that  is,  the  state.  And  at  the  end  the  first  officer  seems  to  be 
convinced. 


120  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

tice  forces  us  to  recognise  the  purest  type  of  a  soul  in  which  all 
personal  aims  have  been  merged  in  the  thought  of  service. 

His  nature  is  too  noble  for  the  world : 

He  would  not  flatter  Neptune  for  his  trident, 

Or  Jove  for  his  power  to  thunder.     His  heart's  his  mouth : 

What  his  breast  forges,  that  his  tongue  must  vent.^ 

It  is  Coriolanus  alone  who  typifies  purity  of  principle  :  all  the 
other  personages  in  some  form  or  other  exhibit  the  spirit  of 
compromise.  The  tribunes,  as  we  have  seen,  simply  give  expres- 
sion to  the  compromising  claims  of  the  individual ;  their  office  has 
been  created  in  a  moment  of  panic,  by  a  patrician  party  who  shrink 
from  carrying  their  political  ideal  to  its  logical  conclusion.  Aufid- 
ius  up  to  a  certain  point  keeps  step  with  Coriolanus  :  each  in  his 
respective  state  is  the  absolute  devotee  of  public  service,  and  each 
recognises  the  perfection  of  the  other.^  But  at  last  the  honour 
of  Aufidius  begins  to  be  obscured. 

Mine  emulation 
Hath  not  that  honour  in't  it  had ;  for  where 
I  thought  to  crush  him  in  an  equal  force, 
True  sword  to  sword,  Fll  potch  at  him  some  way, 
Or  wrath  or  craft  may  get  him.^ 

Personal  rivalry  has  here  come  in  as  a  disturbing  force  to  principle  ; 
and,  although  for  a  while  Aufidius's  honour  flames  up  to  its  full 
brightness  when  Coriolanus  surrenders  to  him,  and  he  delights  to 
exalt  his  former  rival  to  the  command  over  himself,"*  yet  Aufidius 
proves  unequal  to  the  strain,  and  yields  to  the  base  envy  which 
plots  against  a  personality  acknowledged  to  be  the  great  bulwark 
of  the  Volscian  state.^  Even  Volumnia  must  be  referred  to  the 
same  side  of  the  antithesis.  In  the  earher  part  of  the  play  not 
only  does  the  mother  of  Coriolanus  seem  the  equal  of  her  heroic 
son,  but  she  is  put  forward  as  the  fount  from  which  has  flowed  his 
public  virtue.     But  as  the  crisis  manifests  itself,  and  the  career 

1  HI.  i.  255. 

2  E.g.  I.  i.  232-40;  I.  iii.  34;  I.  viii ;  IV.  v,  from  108. 
*  I.  X.  12.  4  IV.  V.  142,  207.  6  IV.  vii. 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  121 

and  even  safety  of  Coriolanus  are  at  stake,  Volumnia  begins  to 
draw  apart  from  the  pure  principle  of  her  son,  and  speaks  the 
language  of  compromise,  bidding  him  dissemble,  and  introduce 
into  Rome  itself  the  arts  with  which  he  fights  Rome's  foes.^ 

If  it  be  honour  in  your  wars  to  seem 

The  same  you  are  not,  which,  for  your  best  ends. 

You  adopt  your  policy,  how  is  it  less  or  worse, 

That  it  shall  hold  companionship  in  peace 

With  honour,  as  in  war,  since  that  to  both 

It  stands  in  like  request  ?  ...  It  lies  you  on  to  speak 

To  the  people ;  not  by  your  own  instruction, 

Nor  by  the  matter  which  your  heart  prompts  you, 

But  with  such  words  that  are  but  rooted  in 

Your  tongue,  though  but  bastards  and  syllables 

Of  no  allowance  to  your  bosom's  truth. 

Now,  this  no  more  dishonours  you  at  all 

Than  to  take  in  a  town  with  gentle  words. 

Which  else  would  put  you  to  your  fortune  and 

The  hazard  of  much  blood. 

I  would  dissemble  with  my  nature,  where 

My  fortunes  and  my  friends  at  stake  required 

I  should  do  so  in  honour. 

The  compromising  spirit  so  clearly  described  underlies  Volumnia's 
action  in  the  final  crisis.  The  sympathies  of  the  modern  reader 
are  with  her,  for  she  represents  the  modern  ideal  of  patriotism. 
But,  once  the  ancient  point  of  view  has  been  caught,  it  must  be 
admitted  that  from  this  standpoint  even  patriotism  is  a  compromise 
with  principle ;  it  is  not  pure  devotion  to  the  ideal  of  government, 
but  devotion  to  that  particular  government  with  which  the  individ- 
ual has  been  connected  by  the  accident  of  birth.  Coriolanus,  as 
a  servant  of  the  Volscian  state,  exhibits  the  same  absolute  fidehty 
to  the  public  service  at  all  personal  cost  which  once  he  had  cher- 
ished for  Rome.  Volumnia  on  her  knees  before  the  conqueror 
appears  as  a  force  disturbing  faithful  service  by  motives  of  senti- 
ment and  passion. 

1  III.  ii,  from  41. 


122  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  action  of  the  play,  no  less  than  the  character-drawing,  is 
founded  on  this  antithesis  of  principle  and  compromise,  the  state 
and  the  individual.  The  entanglement  of  the  plot  Hes  essentially 
in  the  opening  situation,  and  not  until  the  fifth  act  in  the  conduct 
of  the  hero.  In  the  earlier  part  all  the  action  serves  to  display  the 
grandeur  of  the  principal  figure  ;  it  is  not  simply  service,  but  mag- 
nificent achievement,  at  the  price  of  infinite  self-devotion,  with 
Coriolanus  rejecting  all  reward,  and  resisting  the  honours  all  are 
thrusting  upon  him,  up  to  the  point  where  further  resistance  would 
be  exalting  his  personal  feeling  against  the  public  voice.^  The 
patricians  insist  upon  office  for  their  hero :  again  he  resists  and 
prefers  to  be  servant  only  of  the  state,  once  more  pushing  his 
resistance  to  the  furthest  point  to  which  the  individual  may 
oppose  the  public  will.^  But  just  here  appears  the  entanglement 
which  the  compromising  spirit  of  the  time  has  admitted  into  the 
constitution  of  Rome;  popular  claims  have  won  recognition  in 
election  to  office,  and  the  candidate's  gown  is  the  outward  symbol 
of  two  incompatible  things  in  conflict,  the  patrician  ideal  of  the 
state  and  the  temporising  courtship  of  individual  plebeians.  It 
may  be  urged  that  Coriolanus  plays  his  part  as  candidate  badly; 
the  tribunes  point  out  "  with  what  contempt  he  wore  the  humble 
weed."  But  what  else  could  be  expected  from  the  situation 
created  against  his  will  for  Coriolanus  ?  Principle  itself  has  been 
arrayed  in  the  garment  of  compromise. 

Why  in  this  woolvish  toge  should  I  stand  here, 
To  beg  of  Hob  and  Dick,  that  do  appear, 
Their  needless  vouches?     Custom  calls  me  to't: 
What  custom  wills,  in  all  things  should  we  do't, 
The  dust  on  antique  time  would  lie  unswept, 
And  mountainous  error  be  too  highly  heap'd 
For  truth  to  o'er-peer.     Rather  than  fool  it  so. 
Let  the  high  office  and  the  honour  go 
To  one  that  would  do  thus.^ 

1 1,  ix.  53-60.  2  n.  i.  218 ;  II.  ii,  from  139;  III.  ii. 

8  II.  iii.  122. 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 23 

The  latent  conflict  works  itself  out  to  a  sharp  crisis :  Coriolanus, 
as  we  have  seen,  makes  one  more  stand  for  pure  principle,  and 
would  sweep  away  at  a  stroke  all  that  has  allowed  popular  claims 
to  interfere  with  the  ideal  of  the  state  and  the  pubHc  service.  It 
has  become  a  question  of  brute  force  :  the  hero  of  the  patricians  is 
worsted  and  receives  sentence  of  banishment.  At  this  height  of  the 
struggle^  comes  the  magnificent  stroke  with  which  Shakespeare,  in 
a  single  flash,  presents  the  whole  issue,  as  Coriolanus  hurls  against 
the  hubbub  of  Rome's  confusion  the  answering  taunt  — 

I   BANISH  YOU  ! 

Not  Rome,  but  Rome  in  the  hands  of  the  tribunes,  is  thus  ad- 
dressed :  the  state  has  committed  political  suicide,  self-surrendered 
to  the  forces  that  disintegrate  it,  before  Coriolanus  abandons  it. 
The  principle  at  stake  is  not  patriotism,  which  roots  the  individual 
to  the  soil  where  he  has  grown ;  dismissed  from  the  state  it  has  so 
gloriously  served,  the  life  of  service  is  free  to  transfer  itself  to 
another.  Coriolanus  becomes  a  Volscian,  and,  with  no  popular 
turbulence  to  interfere,  leads  the  Volscian  armies  to  victory. 
This  may  be  called  revenge,  but  it  is  no  less  service ;  and  the 
service  is  as  flawless  as  in  the  old  days. 

Cor.   Wife,  mother,  child,  I  know  not.     My  affairs 
Are  servanted  to  others  :  though  I  owe 
My  revenge  properly,  my  remission  lies 
In  Volscian  breasts.^ 

A  second  crisis  of  the  action  is  made  where  mother,  wife,  and 
child  kneel  in  behalf  of  Rome  before  the  conqueror,^  The  whole 
force  of  kinship  and  patriotism  is  concentrated  in  one  motive. 
But,  from  the  ancient  standpoint,  kinship  and  patriotism  are  an 
exalted  form  of  individuality :  the  two  sides  of  the  antithesis,  the 
state  and  the  individual,  are  seen  in  full  conflict.  The  situation 
has  been  created  which  is  so  dear  to  the  ancient  drama  —  two 

1  III,  iii,  from  120.  2  y.  ii.  88,  and  whole  scene.  »  V.  iii. 


124  THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

opposing  moral  forces  meet  in  the  same  personage  :  the  tragic 
sequel  is  that  the  personage  is  crushed.  Volumnia  does  not  see 
this,  and  speaks  of  reconcihation.^ 

Vol.  If  it  were  so  that  our  request  did  tend 
To  save  the  Romans,  thereby  to  destroy 
The  Volsces  whom  you  serve,  you  might  condemn  us, 
As  poisonous  of  your  honour :  no  ;  our  suit 
Is,  that  you  reconcile  them. 

But  her  son  sees  more  clearly,  and  realises  the  bitter  irony  of  the 
situation.^ 

Cor.   {After  holding  her  by  the  hand,  silent)  O  mother,  mother ! 
What  have  you  done  ?    Behold,  the  heavens  do  ope, 
The  gods  look  down,  and  this  unnatural  scene 
They  laugh  at.     O  my  mother,  mother  !  O  ! 
You  have  won  a  happy  victory  to  Rome ; 
But,  fo''  your  son,  —  believe  it,  O,  believe  it. 
Most  dangerously  you  have  with  him  prevail' d, 
If  not  most  mortal  to  him.     But  let  it  come. 

Coriolanus  understands  that  a  point  has  been  reached  where  he 
must  make  a  final  choice  between  principle  and  compromise  :  the 
embodiment  of  principle  chooses  compromise,  but  he  knows  he  is 
choosing  ruin  for  himself. 

There  is  yet  another  turning-point  before  the  action  of  the  play 
is  complete.  Coriolanus  leading  the  Volscian  army  away  from 
Rome  gives  scope  for  nemesis :  the  devotee  of  principle  has  sur- 
rendered to  compromise,  and  the  ruin  that  follows  comes  as  retri- 
bution. But  all  the  while  there  is  by  the  side  of  the  hero  another 
personality,  in  which  there  has  been  a  far  worse  surrender  of 
honour ;  Aufidius  has  yielded  to  personal  rivalry  and  base  envy, 
and,  by  slander  and  secret  plotting,  at  last  strikes  down  Coriolanus 
on  his  return.^  Instantly,  to  the  spectator  of  the  story,  nemesis 
has  given  place  to  pathos ;  the  hero  falls  a  wronged  man,  and  his 

1 V.  iii.  132.  2  V.  iii.  182.  «  V.  vi. 


ROMAN  LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 2$ 

error  is  forgotten  in  the  thought  of  his  heroism.     Even  Aufidius 
has  a  pang  of  compunction  : 

My  rage  is  gone, 
And  I  am  struck  with  sorrow.^ 

And  it  is  a  lord  of  the  Volscians  who  speaks  the  fitting  epitaph 
for  the  supreme  representative  of  old  Roman  honour : 

Mourn  you  for  him :  let  him  be  regarded 
As  the  most  noble  corse  that  ever  herald 
Did  follow  to  his  urn. 2 


When  we  come  to  the  play  of  Julius  Ccesar,  we  are  met  with 
the  difficulty  that  Shakespeare  has  here  drawn  the  characters  with 
such  subtlety,  and  so  delicately  balanced  the  motives,  that  various 
mipressions  are  left ;  different  readers  find  themselves  at  the  close 
partisans  of  Caesar  or  Brutus.  I  have  elsewhere  analysed  the 
drama  at  length;^  in  the  present  chapter  I  must  be  content  with 
stating  results.  For  myself,  I  am  unable  to  see  any  personal  or 
corrupt  motive  either  in  Caesar  or  in  his  great  opponent.  Brutus, 
at  immense  cost  to  himself,  slays  the  friend  he  loves  in  order,  as 
he  thinks,  to  save  the  country  he  loves  better.  And  Caesar  is 
seeking  absolute  power — which  the  constitution  of  Rome  recog- 
nised to  some  extent  in  its  dictatorship  —  simply  with  the  view  of 
doing  for  Rome  itself  the  service  of  organisation  he  had  done 
outside  for  the  Roman  empire.  The  immediate  point  is  to  survey 
the  drama  from  the  standpoint  of  the  outer  and  the  inner  life. 

The  conflict  between  the  pure  ideal  of  the  state  and  the  grow- 
ing force  of  individuality,  which  the  drama  of  Coriolanus  exhibited 
in  its  first  beginnings,  is  presented  by  Julius  Ccesar  in  a  late 
stage  of  development.  Generations  of  time  have  separated  the 
age  of  the  one  story  from  that  of  the  other,  and  all  the  while  the 
silent  progress  of  human  nature  has  carried  with  it  the  expansion 

IV.  vi.  148.  2V.  vi.  143. 

8  In  my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist:  Chapters  VIII  and  IX. 


126  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

of  the  individual  life ;  the  two  sides  of  the  antithesis  are  now  to  meet 
on  equal  terms.  Rome  is  still  a  republic,  and  the  republican  ideal 
is  a  mighty  force.  But  alike  those  who  cherish  this  ideal,  and  those 
who  oppose  it,  have  been  secretly  moulded  by  the  growth  of  indi- 
vidual character. 

The  multitude,  swayed  hither  and  thither  by  every  orator,  are 
still  the  expression  of  individuaUty  in  its  lowest  form ;  but  with  a 
difference  —  they  are  all-powerful.  The  question  that  seemed  a 
paradox  in  Coriolanus  — 

What  is  the  city,  but  the  people  ?  — 

has  now  won  an  affirmative  answer :  all  look  to  the  people  as  the 
source  of  rule.  The  magnificent  Caesar  can  obtain  his  dominion 
only  if  he  wins  the  popular  voice ;  to  the  mob  the  cause  of  the 
conspirators  must  appeal  for  its  justification. 

The  leading  personages  of  the  story  are  interesting  for  the  bal- 
ance in  each  of  the  outer  and  inner  life.  Especially  peculiar  is 
the  position  of  Caesar  himself.  Advancing  individuality  implies 
increasing  differentiation;  among  the  infinite  possible  forms  that 
personahty  may  take,  we  may  expect  to  find  at  last  an  individu- 
ality taking  the  form  of  service,  of  entire  devotion  to  the  ideal  of 
the  state.  So  it  is  with  the  Caesar  of  this  play.  He  is  Coriolanus 
on  a  larger  moral  scale  :  there  is  here  not  the  simple  valour  which 
found  complete  expression  in  a  Volscian  war,  but  an  all-round  per- 
sonahty, with  infinite  resources  of  intellect  and  loftiness  of  m.oral 
power,  the  whole  concentrated  in  the  government  of  men  and  the 
founding  of  empire  for  Rome.  But  this  Caesar  has  no  inner  life  : 
that  is  to  say,  when  he  is  seen  apart  from  service  to  the  state  he 
exhibits,  not  wrongness,  but  weakness.  His  foes  read  him  as 
"superstitious";  he  dreads  —  to  his  own  surprise  —  the  subtle- 
souled  Cassius ;  on  the  subtle-souled  Antony  he  leans  for  support. 
And,  when  the  great  ruler  of  men  seeks  to  adapt  himself  to  the 
individualities  of  a  mob,  he  finds  himself  bewildered,  vacillating, 
and  without  resource.  Brutus,  who  inherits  from  his  family  high- 
souled  devotion  to  the  state,  has  no  less  a  strong  development  of  his 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  12/ 

individuality ;  it  is  seen  in  his  devotion  to  philosophy  and  music, 
in  his  sympathy  with  the  dehcate  spirit  of  Portia,  and  his  deep 
friendship  for  Caesar.  But  the  inner  life  is  held  down  in  Brutus 
by  sheer  force  of  stoicism,  the  rehgion  that  professes  to  crush  out 
personality ;  by  such  self-suppression  he  is  calm  before  the  raging 
mob,  and  insists  to  Cassius  upon  minutiae  of  business  all  the  while 
that  he  is  concealing  the  blow  of  bereavement  that  has  taken  from 
him  his  Portia.  Cassius  again  is  a  strange  mixture.  At  first  it 
would  seem  as  if  this  machine  politician  and  conspirator  was 
wholly  summed  up  in  the  life  without,  in  devotion  to  the  repubU- 
can  cause.  But  when  we  inquire  what  exactly  is  the  cause  Cassius 
is  serving,  we  find  this  to  be,  not  public  life  as  it  appears  out- 
wardly, but  a  fanatic's  idealised  equality,  an  abstract  impossi- 
bility, such  equality  as  can  exist  only  in  an  individual's  dreaming. 
He  sounds  the  names  ^  ^Caesar,'  *  Brutus,'  and  insists  that  the  per- 
sonalities must  be  as  mechanically  equal  as  the  sounds;  all  the 
difference  between  man  and  man  made  by  genius  and  achieve- 
ment he  ignores ;  paradoxically,  his  individuahty  shows  itself  in  a 
theory  that  objects  to  individuality  even  when  it  has  taken  the 
form  of  service  to  the  state.  In  Antony,  finally,  as  in  the  rest, 
individual  character  has  been  strongly  developed,  and  he  can  thus 
play  with  the  individualities  that  make  up  a  mob.  But  he  is  also, 
in  the  present  drama,  a  zealous  servant  of  the  state;  for  at  this 
juncture,  his  personal  interests  and  the  deliverance  of  Rome  from 
the  conspirators  move  in  one  and  the  same  path. 

The  action  of  the  play,  no  less  than  the  characters,  turns  upon 
the  antithesis  between  the  state  and  the  individual.  The  exact 
issue  is  seen  where  Brutus  in  his  deep  ponderings  pronounces 
Caesar  an  innocent  man,  yet  resolves  to  slay  him  for  the  possi- 
bilities that  might  be.^  Justice  to  the  innocent  is  the  supreme 
claim  of  the  individual :  it  is  here  sacrificed  to  policy,  a  claim  of 
the  state.      The  irony  of  events  brings  a  sequel,  in  which  this 

1 1,  ii.  142. 

2  II.  i :  the  use  of  the  word  affections  in  contrast  with  reason  (line  ao)  just  points 
to  the  antithesis  of  private  and  public  motives. 


128  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

policy  of  the  conspiracy  is  brought  to  its  ruin  by  the  force  of  out- 
raged individuality,  and  Brutus,  ere  he  dies,  recognises  that  Julius 
Caesar  is  mighty  after  his  death.^  In  the  moment  of  triumph  the 
conspirators  made  their  claim  to  be  — 

The  men  that  gave  their  country  liberty. 

Their  conception  of  'liberty'  was  to  free  Rome  from  a  Julius 
Caesar,  seeking  power  for  Rome's  sake  :  the  issue  of  their  action 
was  to  deliver  Rome  to  an  Antony  and  an  Octavius,  seeking  power 
only  for  themselves. 

Not  a  long  course  of  years,  but  a  sudden  revolution,  separates 
the  third  play  of  the  trilogy  from  the  second.  Mob  rule  as  an 
expression  of  unbridled  individuality  has  been  allowed  the  free 
play  which  has  led  naturally  to  its  own  ruin. 

This  common  body, 
Like  to  a  vagabond  flag  upon  the  stream, 
Goes  to  and  back,  lackeying  the  varying  tide, 
To  rot  itself  with  motion. ^ 

The  irresistible  advance  of  popular  claims  has  eventuated  in 
empire ;  the  end  of  the  conflict  between  the  state  and  the  indi- 
vidual is  that  an  individual  has  now  become  the  state.  It  might 
seem,  indeed,  that  in  the  present  case  there  were  two  individuali- 
ties, or  at  first  three  :  the  Roman  world  is  in  the  hands  of  a  trium- 
virate. But  this  is  only  appearance.  Lepidus  is  never  anything 
but  a  figurehead.^  Octavius  Caesar  is  a  power,  destined  in  the 
final  issue  to  be  a  dominant  power ;  but  at  the  opening  of  the 
play  Caesar  is  no  power  as  against  Antony.  Caesar  loses  hearts 
where  he  gets  money;*  on  the  testimony  of  the  common  enemy 
Antony's  soldiership  "  is  twice  the  other  twain  "  ;*  history  is  in  the 
drama  of  Shakespeare  so  moulded  as  to  imply  that  the  empire  of 
the  world  is  Antony's,  if  he  chooses  to  grasp  it. 

1  V.  iii.  94.  2  Antony  and  Cleopatra,  L  iv.  44. 

8  IL  i.  16;  II.  vii;  III.  v.    Compare  Julius  Ccesar :  IV.  i,  from  12. 
*  Antony  and  Cleopatra,  II.  i.  13,  6  11.  i.  34. 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 29 

But  why  this  "if"?  What  should  hold  back  Antony  from  the 
universal  dominion  which  it  is  his  to  command  ?  We  have  seen, 
in  the  play  oi  Julius  Ccesar,  how  the  two  sides  of  Antony's  nature 
are  there  in  harmony.  He  has  a  complex  individuality  in  touch 
with  every  element  of  human  nature ;  but  he  brings  this  individu- 
ality of  his  into  public  Hfe,  and,  in  the  storms  of  revolution,  this  is 
the  means  by  which  he  conquers  all  hearts  and  wins  supremacy. 
But  in  the  present  play  a  new  force  has  emerged,  which  touches 
the  individual  nature  of  Antony,  and  sways  it  in  a  direction  away 
from  the  public  career  inviting  him.     This  force  is  Cleopatra. 

Even  Shakespeare's  power  of  painting  human  nature  has  ex- 
hibited no  greater  feat  than  his  Cleopatra.  We  cannot  sketch  her 
character,  for  character  is  just  what  she  has  not.  Cleopatra  is  not 
a  woman,  but  a  bundle  of  all  womanly  qualities  tied  together  by 
the  string  of  pure  caprice.  She  does  not  appear  as  a  human  soul, 
but  as  a  "  great  fairy,"  an  enchantress ;  it  is  her  "  magic "  that 
has  ruined  Antony.^    She  is  addressed  as  one  — 

Whom  every  thing  becomes,  to  chide,  to  laugh, 
To  weep ;  whose  every  passion  fully  strives 
To  make  itself,  in  thee,  fair  and  admired !  ^ 

The  humorist  of  the  play  sees  in  her  something  elemental. 

Antony.     She  is  cunning  past  man's  thought. 

Enobarbus.  Alack,  sir,  no  ;  her  passions  are  made  of  nothing 
but  the  finest  part  of  pure  love :  we  cannot  call  her  winds  and 
waters  sighs  and  tears  ;  they  are  greater  storms  and  tempests 
than  almanacs  can  report :  this  cannot  be  cunning  in  her ;  if 
it  be,  she  makes  a  shower  of  rain  as  well  as  Jove.^ 

Whatever  charms  of  person  or  arts  of  wooing  other  women  may 
have,  Cleopatra  has  them  all :  but  as  readily  can  she  use  their 
opposites. 

I  saw  her  once 

Hop  forty  paces  through  the  public  street ; 

And  having  lost  her  breath,  she  spoke,  and  panted, 

1 IV.  viii.  12;  I.  ii.  132;  III.  x.  19.  2  i.  j.  ^g.  8  i,  ii.  150. 

K 


I30  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

That  she  did  make  defect  perfection, 
And,  breathless,  power  breathe  forth.  .  .   . 
Age  cannot  wither  her,  nor  custom  stale 
Her  infinite  variety  :  other  women  cloy 
The  appetites  they  feed,  but  she  makes  hungry 
Where  most  she  satisfies  :  for  vilest  things 
Become  themselves  in  her.^ 

She  can  enter  into  every  passing  mood  of  Antony,  breathing  out 
naval  heroism  when  he  incHnes  to  fight  by  sea ;  ^  or,  at  will,  Cleo- 
patra can  entice  by  mocking. 

If  you  find  him  sad, 
Say  I  am  dancing ;  if  in  mirth,  report 
That  I  am  sudden  sick.^ 

She  can  sail  close  to  the  wind,  and  irritate  the  compunctiog^An- 
tony  feels  for  the  noble  wife  he  has  forsaken. 

Why  should  I  think  you  can  be  mine  and  true, 
Though  you  in  swearing  shake  the  throned  gods, 
Who  have  been  false  to  Fulvia?* 

Arbitrary  individuality  is  incarnate  in  Cleopatra :  and  this  is  just 
what  has  conquered  Antony.  He  himself  amongst  men  had  been 
the  myriad-sided.  His  oration,  in  which  he  could  catch  every 
fluctuating  passion  of  the  mob,  and  draw  them  all  into  whatever 
harmony  he  chose,  was  like  the  virtuoso  exhibiting  the  powers  of 
his  instrument ;  but  when  Cleopatra  comes  in,  it  is  as  if  the  instru- 
ment were  to  play  the  virtuoso.  The  great  soul,  that  can  sway 
men's  passions  in  any  direction  he  pleases,  is  himself  adrift  in  a 
sea  of  feminine  passions,  that  knows  no  shore  of  a  responsible 
soul. 

Thus  the  antithesis  of  the  world  without  and  the  world  within, 
instead  of  disappearing,  has  in  the  third  play  of  the  trilogy  come 
back  in  a  new  form.  The  rivalry  of  the  state  and  the  individual 
is  now  to  be  seen  within  the  personality  of  Antony  himself:  it  is 

1 II.  ii.  233.  2  III,  vii,  from  29.  8  i.  Hi.  3,  i  i.  m,  27. 


ROMAN  LIFE  DRAMATISED  I3I 

the  conflict,  for  Antony,  between  his  public  and  his  private  life. 
This  one  individual,  if  only  he  chooses  to  give  himself  to  public 
affairs,  has  world  empire  in  his  grasp.  But  it  is  also  possible  for 
Antony  to  find  his  world  elsewhere. 

Ant.   Let  Rome  in  Tiber  melt,  and  the  wide  arch 

Of  the  ranged  empire  fall !     Here  is  my  space. 

Kingdoms  are  clay  :  our  dungy  earth  alike 

Feeds  beast  as  man :  the  nobleness  of  life 

Is  to  do  thus  ;  when  such  a  mutual  pair  [Embracing. 

And  such  a  twain  can  doH,  in  which  1  bind, 

On  pain  of  punishment,  the  world  to  weet 

We  stand  up  peerless. ^ 

For  this  cornpeting  public  and  private  life  of  Antony  there  is  an 
external  measure  in  the  movement  of  the  play :  Antony  conjoin- 
ing himself  with  Caesar  is  the  Hfe  rising  to  public  duty ;  Antony 
inclining  to  Cleopatra  is  the  life  falling  to  private  passion. 

The  action  of  the  drama,  viewed  from  this  standpoint,  falls  into 
five  well-marked  stages.^ 

I.  A  portion  of  the  poem  displays  the  opening  situation  :  An- 
tony, under  the  spell  of  Cleopatra,  is  neglecting  public  for  private 
life.  His  colleagues  in  Rome  are  merely  waiting ;  and  this  is  the 
situation  as  they  see  it.^ 

From  Alexandria 
This  is  the  news  :  he  fishes,  drinks  and  wastes 
The  lamps  of  night  in  revel :  is  not  more  manlike 
Than  Cleopatra,  nor  the  queen  of  Ptolemy 
More  womanly  than  he :  hardly  gave  audience,  or 

Vouchsafed  to  think  he  had  partners Let  us  grant,  it  is  not 

Amiss  to  tumble  on  the  bed  of  Ptolemy, 
To  give  a  kingdom  for  a  mirth,  to  sit 
And  keep  the  turn  of  tippling  with  a  slave, 

1  L  i-  33- 

2  Of  course  these  stages  cannot  be  separated  into  acts  and  scenes.  Thus,  An- 
tony in  Egypt  passes  in  L  ii  from  the  first  to  the  second  stage;  while  in  I.  iv  they 
are  in  Rome  still  discussing  the  opening  situation. 

8  I.  iv. 


132  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

To  reel  the  streets  at  noon  and  stand  the  buffet 

With  knaves  that  smell  of  sweat :  .  .  .  yet  must  Antony 

No  way  excuse  his  soils,  when  we  do  bear 

So  great  weight  in  his  lightness.     If  he  fill'd 

His  vacancy  with  his  voluptuousness, 

Full  surfeits,  and  the  dryness  of  his  bones, 

Call  on  him  for't :  but  to  confound  such  time 

That  drums  him  from  his  sport,  and  speaks  as  loud 

As  his  own  state  and  ours,  —  'tis  to  be  chid 

As  we  rate  boys,  who,  being  mature  in  knowledge, 

Pawn  their  experience  to  their  present  pleasure, 

And  so  rebel  to  judgement. 

Meanwhile,  with  no  power  to  check,  piracy  is  infesting  the  seas 
and  making  inroads  upon  land ;  Parthian  conquests  are  extending 
further  and  further  westwards ;  Pompey  is  coming  into  view  as  a 
new  centre  for  the  popular  turbulence  to  gather  about.  Messen- 
gers bring  tidings  to  Antony  ^j  and  at  last  he  brings  himself  to 
realise  the  situation. 

O,  then  we  bring  forth  weeds 
When  our  quick  minds  lie  still ;  and  our  ills  told  us 
Is  as  our  earing  .  .  . 

These  strong  Egyptian  fetters  I  must  break, 
Or  lose  myself  in  dotage  ... 
Ten  thousand  harms,  more  than  the  ills  I  know, 
My  idleness  doth  hatch, ^ 

2.  The  shock  of  Fulvia's  death  ^  makes  the  point  at  which  the 
rise  of  Antony  begins.  In  the  midst  of  his  mirth  **a  Roman 
thought  has  struck  him,"  and  his  mind  opens  to  take  in  all  that 
he  is  letting  shp.  Cleopatra  in  vain  brings  her  whole  armoury  to 
bear;  taunts  and  tenderness,  despair  and  defiance,  succeed  one 
another  in  quick  turns  of  paradox ;  she  can  only  end  by  blessing 
Antony's  departure,  and  will  unpeople  Egypt,  if  necessary,  to  fol- 
low him  up  with  messengers.*    Pompey  and  his  allies  are  just 

1 1,  ii,  from  92.  .    «  I.  ii.  121. 

>  I.  ii.  113.  *I.  iii,  V. 


ROMAN  LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 33 

gloating  over  the  certainty  that  Egyptian  seductions  will  main- 
tain the  disunion  through  which  they  are  strong,  when  tidings  are 
brought  that  Antony  is  every  hour  expected  in  Rome.^  His  ar- 
rival has  changed  the  whole  situation.  Where  Antony  and  Caesar 
are  together,  Antony  seems  to  prevail  by  sheer  weight  of  person- 
ahty ;  Caesar,  lately  the  representative  of  morahty  rebuking  disso- 
luteness, sinks  into  the  second  place,  and  all  his  sharp  complaints 
have  the  effect  of  drawing  out  a  moral  nature  loftier  than  his  own.^ 
All  seems  now  to  depend  upon  binding  these  two  powers  to- 
gether; and  the  sagacity  of  Agrippa  has  found  a  link  in  Octavia, 
sister  of  Caesar,  whom  the  widower  Antony  may  now  take  to  wife. 
This  policy  effected,  the  empire  of  the  world  seems  to  fall  into 
order  again :  adequate  powers  are  despatched  against  the  Par- 
thian foe,^  Pompey  and  his  allies  exchange  enmity  for  submission ; 
all  seems  to  settle  into  peace  and  hospitable  revels."*  Only  the 
humorist  of  the  story  looks  ahead  far  enough  to  see  other  possi- 
bilities in  this  marriage  of  Octavia  and  Antony. 

He  will  to  his  Egyptian  dish  again :  then  shall  the  sighs  of 
Octavia  blow  the  fire  up  in  Caesar;  and,  as  I  said  before, 
that  which  is  the  strength  of  their  amity  shall  prove  the 
immediate  author  of  their  variance.^ 

3.  The  fulfilment  of  this  prophecy  is  the  fall  of  Antony.  Even 
when  the  contract  was  newly  made,  the  arrival  of  the  Soothsayer 
from  Cleopatra  brought  in  for  a  moment  the  atmosphere  of  Egypt, 
and  Antony  recognised  the  hollowness  of  the  reconciliation  : 

Though  I  make  this  marriage  for  my  peace, 
r  the  East  my  pleasure  lies.* 

When  Antony  and  Caesar  are  separated  by  distance,  the  divergence 
increases  apace.  The  unhappy  Octavia,  who  must  "  pray  for  both 
parts,"  seeks  from  her  husband  the  task  of  reconciler/ 

1 II.  i.  8  II.  iii.  40.  «  II.  vi.  134.  7  III.  iv. 

2  II.  u.  *  II.  vi,  vii ;  III.  i.  6  ji.  Hi.  39. 


134  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

The  Jove  of  power  make  me,  most  weak,  most  weak, 
Your  reconciler!     Wars  'twixt  you  twain  would  be 
As  if  the  world  should  cleave,  and  that  slain  men 
Should  solder  up  the  rift. 

Antony's  assent  to  her  mission  is  only  his  way  of  casting  her  off: 
when  Octavia  arrives  in  Rome  all  the  world  knows  her  shame.^ 
Meanwhile  the  whole  east  under  Antony  stands  arrayed  against 
Caesar  and  the  west ;  to  the  amazement  of  Antony,  Caesar  ad- 
vances stage  after  stage  with  a  celerity  passing  all  belief,  and  the 
critical^  battle  is  close  at  hand.  Just  here  is  seen  that  which 
makes  the  fall  of  Antony  a  distinct  stage  of  the  action.  In  the 
opening  situation  Antony  was  simply  neglecting  public  duty  for 
private  gratification :  now,  he  allows  the  private  life  to  infect  the 
pubHc  with  its  own  spirit. 
Antony.  Canidius,  we 

Will  fight  with  him  by  sea. 
Cleopatra.  By  sea,  what  else? 

Canidius.      Why  will  my  lord  do  so  ? 

Antony.  For  that  he  dares  us  to't. 

Enobarbus.    So  hath  my  lord  dared  him  to  single  fight. 
Canidius.      Ay,  and  to  wage  this  battle  at  Pharsalia, 

Where  Caesar  fought  with  Pompey :  but  these  offers, 
Which  serve  not  for  his  vantage,  he  shakes  off. 
And  so  should  you. 
Enobarbus.  Your  ships  are  not  well  mann'd. 

Your  mariners  are  muleters,  reapers,  people 
Ingross'd  by  swift  impress  ;  in  Caesar's  fleet 
Are  those  that  often  have  'gainst  Pompey  fought : 
Their  ships  are  yare,  yours,  heavy :  no  disgrace 
Shall  fall  you  for  refusing  him  at  sea. 
Being  prepared  for  land. 
Antony.  By  sea,  by  sea. 

Enobarbus.   Most  worthy  sir,  you  therein  throw  away 

The  absolute  soldiership  you  have  by  land, 
Distract  your  army,  which  doth  most  consist 
Of  war-mark'd  footmen,  leave  unexecuted 

1  III.  vi,  from  39.  ^  So  Caesar  Seems  to  think  in  III.  viii. 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 35 

Your  own  renowned  knowledge,  quite  forego 

The  way  which  promises  assurance,  and 

Give  up  yourself  merely  to  chance  and  hazard 

From  firm  security. 
Antony.  I'll  fight  at  sea. 

Cleopat7'a.     I  have  sixty  sails,  Caesar  none  better. 
Antony.         Our  overplus  of  shipping  will  we  burn  ; 

And,  with  the  rest  full-mann'd,  from  the  head  of  Actium 

Beat  the  approaching  Caesar.i 

Mere  personal  rivalry,  and  the  thought  that  Cleopatra  will  look  on, 
inspire  Antony  with  the  gambler's  passion  for  risking  awful  odds, 
while  there  is  a  wise  alternative  which  the  whole  army  implores 
him  to  take.  The  battle  follows  and  Cleopatra  is  the  first  to  flee ; 
Antony's  heart  is  tied  to  her  rudder  strings,  and  he  hurries  after 
her.  Only  then  does  Antony  wake  up  to  the  sense  that  he  has 
fled  before  the  effeminate  Caesar,  and  that  the  battle  on  which 
universal  empire  depends  is  lost :  he  knows  "  he  is  so  lated  in  the 
world  that  he  has  lost  his  way  forever."  ^  Even  the  gambler's 
chances  are  no  longer  open  to  him  :  in  vain  he  challenges  Caesar 
to  decide  the  contest  in  single  combat ;  Caesar  would  have  "  the 
old  ruffian  know  he  has  many  other  ways  to  die."  ^  All  his  fol- 
lowers can  read  clearly  the  lesson  of  their  great  leader's  fall. 

Enobarbus.  I  see  men's  judgements  are 

A  parcel  of  their  fortunes,  and  things  outward 
Do  draw  the  inward  quality  after  them. 
To  suffer  all  alike  .  .  .  Caesar,  thou  hast  subdued 
His  judgement  too.* 

Antony  at  last  realises  it  to  the  full. 

Ant.  When  we  in  our  viciousness  grow  hard  — 

O  misery  on't  !  —  the  wise  gods  seel  our  eyes ; 
In  our  own  filth  drop  our  clear  judgements ;  make  us 
Adore  our  errors ;  laugh  at's,  while  we  strut 
To  our  confiision.^ 

1  III.  vii,  from  28.  «  IV,  i.  4.  5  m.  xiii.  m. 

2III.xi.3.  4  III.  xiii.  31. 


136  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

4.  The  doom  of  Antony  has  been  sealed,  though  the  struggle 
continues  a  while  longer.  The  diminution  of  the  captain's  brain, 
as  Enobarbus  says,  has  restored  his  heart :  ^  with  supreme  outburst 
of  valour  Antony  fights  another  battle,  and  beats  the  enemy  to 
their  beds.  A  second  fight  is  waged  by  sea  and  land  :  in  the  crisis 
of  the  day  the  Egyptian  fleet  deserts  bodily  to  the  enemy.  Then 
the  fall  of  Antony  is  complete :  retribution  has  its  full  sway  when 
the  final  stroke  has^orae  from  Cleopatra.  But  a  fourth  stage  of  the 
action  has  become  apparent,  mingling  with  the  preceding  in  the 
scenes  of  the  play :  ^  when  once  the  doom  of  Antony  has  been 
assured,  nemesis  may  gradually  change  to  pathos.  The  hero  is 
plunged  in  tragic  ruin,  so  far  as  the  outer  life  is  concerned,  and 
the  ruin  is  just  recompense ;  but  the  inner  life  has  now  scope  to 
reveal  itself,  and  the  noble  personality  that  is  in  Antony  may  rise 
to  its  full  height  amid  the  fragments  of  his  shattered  career.  The 
infatuated  commander  disappears  in  the  grand  soldier;  prodigies 
of  valour  and  generalship  are  shown,  with  an  army  passionately 
devoted  to  their  great  chief.  Eros,  the  personal  attendant,  slays 
himself  rather  than  do  his  sworn  duty  in  lifting  his  hand  against 
Antony.  Enobarbus,  at  the  first  sign  of  the  end,  had  made  peace 
for  himself  with  the  enemy :  his  late  master's  generosity  to  the 
deserter  awakens  in  him  a  remorse  that  can  only  be  quenched  by 

death. 

I  am  alone  the  villain  of  the  earth, 

And  feel  I  am  so  most.     O  Antony, 

Thou  mine  of  bounty,  how  would'st  thou  have  paid 

My  better  service,  when  my  turpitude 

Thou  dost  so  crown  with  gold  !   .   .   .     I  will  go  seek 

Some  ditch  wherein  to  die. 

Kingly  flashes  of  just  resentment,  regardless  of  helplessness,  show 
the  conqueror's  advance  guard  that  it  is  better  playing  with  a  lion's 
whelp  than  with  an  old  lion  dying.  Cleopatra,  proved  a  traitor,  is 
cast  off" ;  but,  when  the  (false)  news  of  her  death  seems  to  vindi- 

1  III.  xiii.  195-200. 

2  It  affects  the  whole  spirit  of  Act  IV,  but  appears  more  especially  from  Scene 
xiv. 


ROMAN  LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 3/ 

cate  her  innocence,  the  old  love  for  which  the  world  has  been  lost 
returns  in  all  its  deepness,  and.  this  is  the  end  for  Antony. 

Unarm,  Eros  ;  the  long  day^s  task  is  done, 

And  we  must  sleep    .    .    .    From  me  awhile. 

I  will  overtake  thee,  Cleopatra,  and 

Weep  for  my  pardon.     So  it  must  be,  for  now 

All  length  is  torture :  since  the  torch  is  out, 

Lie  down  and  stray  no  farther  ...  I  come,  my  queen  .  .   . 

Where  souls  do  couch  on  flowers,  we'll  hand  in  hand. 

And  with  our  sprightly  port  make  the  ghosts  gaze  : 

Dido  and  her  i^neas  shall  want  troops, 

And  all  the  haunt  be  ours. 

It  is  a  Roman  climax  that  Antony  should  take  his  life  with  his  own 
good  sword. 

Not  Caesar's  valour  hath  o'erthrown  Antony, 
But  Antony's  hath  triumph'd  on  itself. 

But  it  is  a  lingering  death,  and  the  guards  fill  the  air  with  clamour. 

Ant.    Nay,  good  my  fellows,  do  not  please  sharp  fate 

To  grace  it  with  your  sorrows :  bid  that  welcome 
Which  comes  to  punish  us,  and  we  punish  it 
Seeming  to  bear  it  lightly. 

Before  death  comes,  Cleopatra  is  known  to  be  living,  and  the  two 
meet :  she,  afraid  to  leave  the  monument  lest  she  be  taken  prisoner 
by  C3esar,  he,  to  the  last  advising  how  his  love  may  be  secure  in 
treating  with  the  conqueror. 

Ant.    The  miserable  change  now  at  my  end 

Lament  nor  sorrow  at,  but  please  your  thoughts 
In  feeding  them  with  those  my  former  fortunes 
Wherein  I  lived,  the  greatest  prince  o'  the  world, 
The  noblest ;  and  do  not  now  basely  die. 
Not  cowardly  put  off  my  helmet  to 
My  countryman,  —  a  Roman  by  a  Roman 
Valiantly  vanquish'd.     Now  my  spirit  is  going ; 
I  can  no  more. 

Caesar  and  his  followers  confirm  the  epitaph.^ 

1 V.  i.  30. 


138  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

McBcenas.  His  taints  and  honours 

Waged  equal  with  him. 

Agrippa.  A  rarer  spirit  never 

Did  steer  humanity  :  but  you,  gods,  will  give  us 
Some  faults  to  make  us  men.     Caesar  is  touch'd. 

5.  But  yet  a  further  stage  is  to  be  seen  in  the  action  of  this 
drama.^  The  steady  movement  of  relentless  tragedy  at  last  seems 
to  awaken  a  soul  in  Cleopatra  herself.  All  the  while  that  Antony 
has  been  standing  at  bay  with  ruin,  and  dying  all  nobleness  and 
love,  the  Egyptian  has  been  packing  cards  with  the  conqueror, 
ready  if  needs  be  to  betray  her  lover.  But  the  actual  death  of 
Antony  thrills  a  touch  of  womanhood  into  the  fairy  enchantress 
of  male  hearts. 

No  more,  but  e'en  a  woman,  and  commanded 

By  such  poor  passion  as  the  maid  that  milks 

And  does  the  meanest  chares  .  .  .  All's  but  naught ; 

Patience  is  sottish,  and  impatience  does 

Become  a  dog  that's  mad  :  then  is  it  sin 

To  rush  into  the  secret  house  of  death, 

Ere  death  dare  come  to  us  ?  .  .  . 

We'll  bury  him  :  and  then,  what's  brave,  what's  noble, 

Let's  do  it  after  the  high  Roman  fashion. 

And  make  death  proud  to  take  us. 

It  is  but  an  imitative  virtue  which  has  begun  to  animate  Cleopatra, 
and  it  is  seen  side  by  side  with  negotiations  by  which  she  tries  her 
false  arts  on  a  Caesar  as  false  as  herself.  But  with  growing  hopeless- 
ness the  new  thought  gains  strength.^ 

My  desolation  does  begin  to  make 

A  better  life.     'Tis  paltry  to  be  Caesar ; 

Not  being  Fortune,  he's  but  Fortune's  knave, 

A  minister  of  her  will :  and  it  is  great 


1  In  the  main,  Act  V;  commencing  from  the  death  of  Antony  in  IV.  xiv. 
2V.ii. 


ROMAN   LIFE  DRAMATISED  1 39 

To  do  that  thing  that  ends  all  other  deeds  ; 
Which  shackles  accidents  and  bolts  up  change ; 
Which  sleeps,  and  never  palates  more  the  dug, 
The  beggar's  nurse  and  Caesar's. 

One  more  negotiation,  and  attempt  to  save  something  out  of  the 
wreck,  and  suddenly  Cleopatra  finds  herself  taken  prisoner  by 
treachery.  Now  the  outer  skin  of  feminine  daintiness  in  which 
her  wild  spirit  had  ever  been  wrapped  is  touched. 

This  mortal  house  I'll  ruin, 
Do  Caesar  what  he  can.     Know,  sir,  that  I 
Will  not  wait  pinion'd  at  your  master's  court, 
Nor  once  be  chastised  with  the  sober  eye 
Of  dull  Octavia.     Shall  they  hoist  me  up 
And  show  me  to  the  shouting  varletry 
Of  censuring  Rome? 

Two  motives  are  combining  their  full  force  in  Cleopatra  :  outraged 
delicacy,  and  memory  of  Antony. 

I  dream'd  there  was  an  Emperor  Antony  .  .  . 
His  legs  bestrid  the  ocean :  his  rear'd  arm 
Crested  the  world  :  his  voice  was  propertied 
As  all  the  tuned  spheres,  and  that  to  friends ; 
But  when  he  meant  to  quail  and  shake  the  orb, 
He  was  as  rattling  thunder.     For  his  bounty,  ^ 
There  was  no  winter  in't ;  and  autumn  'twas 
That  grew  the  more  by  reaping.^ 

Unity  of  purpose  becomes  ever  stronger,  and  settles  into  a  charac- 
ter for  Cleopatra. 

Now  from  head  to  foot 

I  am  marble-constant ;  now  the  fleeting  moon 

No  planet  is  of  mine.^ 

The  two  elements  of  this  character  are  reflected  in  the  final  scene  : 
she  has  "pursued  conclusions  infinite  to  die,"  and  discovered  the 

1 V.  ii.  76,  2  V.  11.  240. 


140  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

delicate  wonder  of  the  aspic ;  yet,  in  approaching  death,  she  is 

rising  nearer  to  Antony. 

I  have 
Immortal  longings  in  me  .  .  .  methinks  I  hear 
Antony  call ;  I  see  him  rouse  himself 
To  praise  my  noble  act ;  I  hear  him  mock 
The  luck  of  Caesar  .  .  .  Husband,  I  come : 
Now  to  that  name  my  courage  prove  my  title! 
I  am  fire  and  air :  my  other  elements 
I  give  to  baser  life.^ 

So,  in  royal  robes  and  crown,  her  maidens  beside  her  sharing  her 
fate,  Cleopatra  finds  the  stroke  of  death  like  a  lover's  pinch,  which 
hurts  and  is  desired ;  as  sweet  as  balm,  as  soft  as  air.  What  the 
Roman  conquerors  break  in  to  behold  is  the  ideal  of  Roman  con- 
stancy imitated  in  the  cold  marble  of  luxurious  daintiness. 

She  shall  be  buried  by  her  Antony : 
No  grave  upon  the  earth  shall  clip  in  it 
A  pair  so  famous.     High  events  as  these 
Strike  those  that  make  them ;  and  their  story  is 
No  less  in  pity  than  his  glory  which 
Brought  them  to  be  lamented. 

1  V.  ii,  from  283. 


VII 

MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED 

Poetry  is  the  chemistry  of  human  life,  and  the  theatre  is  the 
moral  laboratory.  Just  as  the  physicist  supplements  observation 
by  experiment,  setting  up  artificial  combinations  of  forces  in  order 
that  he  may  watch  these  working  out  to  a  natural  issue,  so  it  is 
the  high  function  of  story  to  initiate  some  special  situation  of 
characters  and  circumstances  pregnant  with  moral  suggestiveness ; 
the  course  of  the  story  then  follows  the  situation  as  in  the  nature 
of  things  it  unfolds  itself  and  reaches  a  point  of  satisfaction,  the 
initial  doubt  satisfied,  the  initial  perplexity  resolved  into  clearness. 
The  Shakespearean  drama  abounds  in  these  moral  problems  drama- 
tised. Sometimes  the  situation  which  constitutes  the  problem 
seems  to  arise  casually  in  the  course  of  human  affairs.  In  other 
cases  there  may  be  even  within  the  story  itself  traces  of  con- 
trivance and  design  to  set  up  a  pregnant  situation ;  the  problem 
then  becomes,  in  the  fullest  sense,  an  experiment  in  morals. 

I  have  elsewhere  ^  discussed  at  length  the  play  of  King  Lear  as 
a  problem  drama  :  its  plot  may  be  thus  stated.  When  Lear,  at  a 
check  from  Cordelia,  suddenly  overturns  the  carefully  arranged 
division  of  the  kingdom,  we  have  imperious  passion  overthrowing 
conscience  (represented  in  the  interference  of  Kent),  and  setting 
up  an  unnatural  distribution  of  power :  power  being  taken  from 
the  good  (Cordelia)  and  lodged  in  the  hands  of  the  bad  (Goneril 
and  Regan).  The  situation  of  unstable  moral  equilibrium  thus 
set  up  makes  the  problem  :  for  its  solution  we  trace  three  interests 
side  by  side  in  the  sequel  of  events.     First,  we  have  the  nemesis 

1  In  my  Shakespeare  as  a  DramaHc  Artist :  Chapter  X. 
141 


142  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

upon  the  wrongdoer ;  a  double  nemesis,  for  Lear  receives  only  ill 
from  the  daughters  unjustly  exalted,  only  good  from  the  Cordelia 
he  has  injured.  Again,  in  the  sufferings  of  the  innocent  Cordelia 
and  Kent  we  see  a  second  consequence  of  Lear's  wrong.  For 
a  third,  we  note,  in  the  adulterous  intrigues  of  Goneril  and  Regan, 
how  power  in  the  hands  of  the  evil  is  used  by  them  only  to  work 
out  their  own  destruction.  The  problem  as  thus  stated  is  dupli- 
cated in  the  underplot :  in  the  family  of  Gloucester  a  father  is 
misled  into  an  unnatural  distribution  of  power,  power  being 
wrongfully  taken  from  the  good  (Edgar)  and  assigned  to  the 
bad  (Edmund);  there  is  the  same  triple  series  of  consequences  — 
the  double  nemesis  on  the  wrongdoer,  the  sufferings  of  the  inno- 
cent, the  unrighteous  exaltation  used  by  Edmund  for  the  intrigues 
in  which  he  meets  his  doom.  Again :  the  special  interest  of  the 
Court  Fool  which  is  introduced  into  this  play  serves  to  emphasise 
a  plot  of  this  kind ;  it  is  just  where  Lear's  sufferings  at  the  hands 
of  his  daughters  might  divert  our  sympathies  into  a  different 
channel  that  the  Jester's  part,  with  its  strange  compound  of  idle 
fooling  with  home  thrusts  of  rebuke,  comes  to  keep  before  us  the 
idea  that  Lear  is  only  meeting  the  solution  of  the  problem  his  own 
rash  act  has  set  up.  One  more  interest  completes  the  plot  of 
Lear.  Though  the  underplot  is  a  duplication  of  the  main  plot, 
yet  there  is  a  difference  of  spirit  between  the  two.  When  Lear 
would  sin,  conscience  strongly  embodied  in  Kent  starts  up  to 
hinder;  in  the  case  of  Gloucester  there  is  no  such  restraining 
power,  but,  on  the  contrary,  the  strong  Edmund  is  a  force  tempt- 
ing and  leading  his  too  credulous  father  on  to  his  fatal  error. 
Thus  in  the  dim  background  of  the  story  is  suggested  one  of  the 
fundamental  problems  of  the  moral  world :  how  there  are  two 
types  of  sinners,  those  whose  environment  is  a  restraining  force, 
like  an  embodied  conscience,  and  those  on  the  contrary,  whose 
whole  surroundings  make  one  embodied  temptation.  The  wider 
problem  is  only  touched  ;  something  however  of  solution  is  hinted 
when  we  note  how  the  tempter  who  misleads  Gloucester  is  the 
offspring  of  illicit  amour,  so  announced  by  Gloucester  at  the  be- 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  1 43 

ginning  of  the  play  in  a  tone  of  unrepenting  levity :  ^  the  fruits  of 
the  former  sins  are  seen  to  make  the  temptations  of  the  future. 

In  this  play  the  problem  takes  the  form  of  disturbed  equilibrium  -^ 
in  the  moral  world  working  out  to  a  position  of  rest.  In  Measure  f 
for  Measure  the  movement  is  of  a  different  character :  the  com- 
plexity of  a  situation  may  present  itself  to  our  minds  as  a  problem, 
and  the  solution  will  display  complexity  gradually  drawn  into 
moral  harmony.  Much  of  our  thinking  on  ethical  subjects  falls 
into  the  form  of  antitheses  :  not  oppositions,  as  when  good  is  set 
against  evil,  honesty  against  fraud ;  but  relations  of  ideas  which 
may  be  in  opposition,  but  also  may  be  in  harmony.  A  twofold 
conception  of  this  kind  underlies  the  plot  of  Measure  for  Measure. 
One  is  the  antithesis  of  purity  and  passion.  For  the  other,  the 
old  antithesis  of  .outer  and  inner  life  appears  in  the  form  of  the 
law  and  the  individual.  These  two  antitheses  underiie  all  parts 
of  the  plot,  bringing  its  complexity  up  to  the  level  of  a  moral 
problem;  the  climax  reveals  the  diverse  elements  in  complete 
reconcihation. 

The  life  presented  in  Measure  for  Measure  takes  a  threefold 
form  as  it  is  surveyed  from  the  standpoint  of  purity.  We  have 
what  may  be  called  respectable  life  :  the  law  of  purity  is  here  fully 
accepted  \  there  is  sin  against  purity  in  Angelo  and  Claudio,  but 
their  full  acceptance  of  the  law  plunges  them  in  bitter  remorse. 
Between  this  and  its  opposite  we  find,  represented  in  Lucio,  that 
which  is  excellently  described  by  the  term  ordinary  conversation 
applies  to  it  —  loose  Hfe  :  respectabihty  is  claimed,  yet  there  is 
tampering  with  vice,  the  spirit  of  raillery  acting  like  Milton's  con- 
ception of  an  easy  bridge  from  earth  to  hell.  And  in  the  third 
place  we  have  low  life  :  not  only  is  it  vicious,  but  vice  is  an  accepted 
institution. 

At  this  point  a  question  arises  which  is  a  disturbance  to  many 
readers  :  Why  should  low  life  of  this  type  be  allowed  to  appear  on 
the  stage  at  all  ?    The  iniquity  of  the  brothel  and  the  life  of  pros- 

1  L  i,  from  9.    For  the  whole  chapter  compare  pages  353  and  354. 


144  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

titution  we  are  unwilling  even  to  name  in  ordinary  social  inter- 
course, although  all  know  of  its  existence.  Yet  in  the  poetry  of 
Shakespeare  we  find  such  Hfe  presented ;  more  than  this,  we  seem 
often  led  into  a  sort  of  half  sympathy,  not  indeed  for  the  thing 
itself,  but  for  some  of  those  who  are  involved  in  its  evil. 

The  question  is  part  of  a  wider  one;  and  the  answer  is  the 
easier  if  we  look  at  life  from  the  standpoint  of  our  second  antithe- 
sis, that  of  the  law  and  the  individual.  No  moral  system  can  be 
complete  that  does  not  make  provision  for  what  may  be  called 
Institutional  Ethics :  the  complex  ethical  attitude  that  has  to  be 
maintained  to  the  institution  and  to  the  individuals  involved  in  it. 
War,  considered  in  itself,  must  be  classed  as  a  moral  wrong : 
founded  on  hate,  its  instruments  bloodshed  and  violence,  involv- 
ing at  times  ruthlessness  as  a  positive  duty.  Yet  who  will  ques- 
tion that  among  warriors  are  sometimes  to  be  found  the  highest 
types  of  moral  greatness,  while  the  work  of  war  will  often  serve  as 
a  school  of  self-sacrifice  and  virtue?  Poetry  has  always  known 
how  to  consecrate  the  ideal  of  outlaw  life  by  special  types  of  it, 
although  in  itself  this  life  is  in  antagonism  to  fundamental  laws  of 
property.  Every  reader  of  Paradise  Lost  feels  in  the  course 
of  the  poem  the  attractiveness  of  Satan  as  a  grand  moral  person- 
ality, although  this  Satan,  by  his  position  in  the  universe,  is  irre- 
concilably at  war  with  supreme  Good,  and  is  seeking  to  seduce 
innocence  into  his  own  perversion.  We  have  to  separate,  mentally, 
the  institution  and  the  individual ;  responsibiUty  for  the  institution 
is  one  thing,  responsibility  of  the  individual  is  another.  Whereso- 
ever the  responsibility  for  a  war  rests,  there  is  terrible  guilt ;  but 
this  does  not  suspend  the  moral  law  for  the  individuals  plunged 
into  war  without  fault  on  their  part.  In  practical  Hfe  it  may  be 
almost  impossible  to  separate  the  two  responsibilities.  The  judge 
may  not  say  to  the  prisoner  :  The  burglary  of  which  you  have  been 
convicted  deserves  a  ten  years'  sentence,  but,  in  consideration  of 
the  magnificent  stand  you  made  against  the  police  while  your 
young  comrade  was  escaping,  I  reduce  your  sentence  by  one  half. 
The  judge  would  be  more  likely  to  increase  the  sentence  for  an 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  145 

additional  offence  against  social  order ;  yet  the  irresponsible  by- 
stander would  nevertheless  be  touched  by  self-sacrificing  comrade- 
ship, and  all  the  more  touched  by  the  fact  that  it  was  exhibited  in 
a  burglar.  Now,  in  all  art  we  who  see  or  read  are  in  the  position  of 
spectators  :  we  may  give  our  full  sympathy  to  the  individual  with- 
out any  sense  of  responsibility  for  the  institution.  There  is,  of 
course,  nothing  in  Shakespeare  to  make  the  vicious  institution 
itself  attractive.     The  Friar  voices  our  loathing  of  it : 

The  evil  that  thou  causest  to  be  done, 
That  is  thy  means  to  live.     Do  thou  but  think 
What  'tis  to  cram  a  maw  or  clothe  a  back 
From  such  a  filthy  vice.^ 

The  preacher's  moralising  on  lust  as  the  path  to  destruction  does 
not  come  home  so  keenly  as  Pompey's  humour  when  he  finds  him- 
self in  the  common  prison. 

I  am  as  well  acquainted  here  as  I  was  in  our  house  of  profes- 
sion :  one  would  think  it  were  Mistress  Overdone's  own  house, 
for  here  be  many  of  her  old  customers.  .  .  .  We  have  here 
young  Dizy,  and  young  Master  Deep- Vow,  and  Master  Copper- 
spur,  and  Master  Starve-lackey  the  rapier  and  dagger  man, 
and  young  Drop-heir  that  killed  lusty  Pudding,  and  Master 
Forthlight  the  tilter,  and  brave  Master  Shooty  the  great 
traveller,  and  wild  Half-can  that  stabbed  Pots,  and,  I  think, 
forty  more ;  all  great  doers  in  our  trade,  and  are  now  '  for  the 
Lord's  sake.'  2 

Meanwhile,  even  in  this  region  of  accepted  vice,  moral  differences 
are  yet  to  be  discriminated,  and  our  sympathy  distinguishes  be- 
tween such  as  Overdone,  who  is  vicious  and  nothing  else,  and 
Pompey,  in  whom,  though  he  may  be  as  guilty  as  his  mistress,  the 
salt  of  humour  has  kept  the  human  nature  from  going  entirely  bad. 
Not  only  the  general  field  of  Hfe  surveyed  but  also  the  individ- 
ual personages  rest  for  their  dramatic  interest  on  the  same  ideas. 

1  III.  ii.  21.  2  IV.  iii.  I. 


146  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  most  important  personages  of  the  play  group  themselves 
naturally  around  the  antithesis  of  purity  and  passion.  Especially 
interesting  is  Angelo.  The  contrast  between  the  Angelo  of  the 
opening  scenes  and  Angelo  fallen  is  not  a  contrast  to  be  explained 
by  hypocrisy.  Angelo  is  sincere  in  his  devotion  to  purity,  and  Isa- 
bella in  time  comes  to  see  this.^  But  his  devotion  —  though  he  is 
ignorant  of  the  fact  until  he  is  tested  —  is  not  to  a  principle,  but 
to  a  cause  :  Angelo  is  a  partisan  of  purity.  It  has  become  a  battle- 
cry  between  parties ;  Angelo  has  taken  his  side,  and  eagerly  adopts 
all  the  livery  of  his  party  and  enthusiasm  of  the  fight,  illustrating 
how  zealously  a  man  may  strive  on  behalf  of  a  principle  which 
nevertheless  has  not  entered  deeply  into  his  heart.  The  Duke's 
word,  "  Lord  Angelo  is  precise,"  suggests  the  "  precisian  "  or  Puri- 
tan ;  we  hear  of  "  the  outward-sainted  deputy,"  of  his  "  settled 
visage,"  his  "  dressings,  characts,  titles,  forms ;  "  the  vicious  in  the 
story  sneer  at  Angelo  as  if  his  blood  were  "  very  snow-broth,"  how 
"  a  sea-maid  spawned  him,"  or  "  he  was  begot  between  two  stock- 
fishes ; "  he  himself  makes  "  levity "  in  Mariana  his  excuse  for 
forsaking  her.^  Above  all,  under  the  full  force  of  temptation  he 
gives  us  a  gUmpse  of  self-revelation : 

Yea,  my  gravity, 
Wherein  —  let  no  man  hear  me  —  I  take  pride, 
Could  I  with  boot  change  for  an  idle  plume. ^ 

At  an  opposite  point  from  this  Angelo  we  have  Isabella,  in  whom 
purity  is  a  passion.  Not  only  is  her  brother's  crime  "  the  vice 
she  most  abhors  and  most  desires  should  meet  the  blow  of  justice," 
but  even  legitimate  passion  she  has  renounced;  she  is  entering 
upon  a  celibate  Ufe,  and  desiring  a  stricter  restraint  for  the  sister- 
hood.* Her  innocence  is  of  course  spotless  from  first  to  last ;  but, 
instead  of  love  harmonised  with  purity,  we  here  have  an  over- 
balancing as  between  the  two  forms  of  good,  and,  passionate  for 

iV.i.4So. 

2  I.  iii.  50;  I.  iv.  57;  in.  i,  89,  90;  in.  ii.  115;  V.  i.  56,  222. 

8  II.  iv.  9.  ■*  I.  iv.  3 ;  II.  ii.  29. 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  I47. 

purity,  Isabella  is  cold  to  claims  of  love.  Hence  even  Lucio 
appears  at  a  moral  advantage  for  a  moment,  when  he  presses  upon 
Isabella  the  duty  to  her  brother  from  which  she  shrinks : 

Lucio.  Our  doubts  are  traitors, 

And  make  us  lose  the  good  we  oft  might  win 
By  fearing  to  attempt.^ 

The  crisis  of  the  story  distracts  Isabella  between  claims  of  kinship 
and  defence  of  outraged  purity ;  we  see  the  overbalanced  nature 
in  the  cruel  rage  with  which  she  turns  upon  her  brother  in  his 
moment  of  weakness.^    Even  before  this  in  soliloquy  she  has  said — 

More  than  our  brother  is  our  chastity. ^ 

No  one  will  dare  to  contradict :  but  what  do  we  think  of  the 
woman  who  can  calmly  formulate  the  principle? 

Two  more  types  complete  this  group.  Mariana  is  all  passion, 
but  it  is  passion  within  the  law  of  purity.  If  she  seems  to  descend 
from  the  highest  tone  in  consenting  to  the  device  by  which  the 
faithless  Angelo  is  won,  yet  this  measures  the  depth  of  the  love 
which  prompts  the  sacrifice.  Mariana  again  is  an  illustration  of 
the  strange  power  of  love  to  fasten  upon  the  ideal,  to  love  the 
man  not  for  what  he  is  but  for  what  he  is  capable  of  becoming.* 
In  Claudio  and  Juliet  we  have  passion  in  conflict  with  the  letter 
of  the  law.  Their  love  is  pure,  their  mutual  fidehty  inviolate; 
what  they  have  sinned  against  is  the  conventional  form  of  marriage 
which  society  throws  as  a  hedge  around  the  law  of  purity,  and 
they  have  done  this  from  motives  of  pecuniary  interest.^  Accord- 
ingly discovery  not  only  brings  them  into  danger,  but  also  plunges 
them  in  remorse. 

The  administration  of  justice  in  this  story  gives  us  a  small  group 
of  characters,  distinguished  by  their  relations  to  the  antithesis  of 
the  law  and  the  individual.  The  Provost  is  perfect  in  the  balance 
of  his  allegiance  to  both.     As  a  subordinate  official,  law  is  to  him 

U.iv.  77.  2111.1,136.  8  11.  iv.  185. 

*  Compare  V.  i.  430-46.  6  L  ii,  from  149. 


148  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

his  oath  of  office,  and  under  the  strongest  temptation  he  will  not 
violate  this ;  ^  within  this  one  limit  he  is  seen  forever  toiling  to 
soften  the  rigour  of  justice  for  those  with  whom  he  has  to  do ;  the 
Duke  recognises  this. 

This  is  a  gentle  provost ;  seldom  when 
The  steeled  gaoler  is  the  friend  of  men.^ 

Elbow  the  constable  belongs  to  the  shallowest  nature  of  which 
men  can  be  made ;  he  is  fussily  all  for  justice,  as  that  whereby  he 
gains  self-importance.^  The  most  interesting  of  the  group  is 
Escalus.  The  administration  of  justice  is  a  perpetual  conflict 
between  law  as  an  orderly  science  and  the  infinite  variety  of  indi- 
vidual cases  to  which  it  has  to  be  applied.  The  opening  of  the 
play  presents  Escalus  as  deeply  versed  in  legal  science.* 

Duke.  The  nature  of  our  people. 

Our  city's  institutions,  and  the  terms 
For  common  justice,  you're  as  pregnant  in 
As  art  and  practice  hath  enriched  any 
That  we  remember. 

But  what  we  see  of  this  magistrate  in  the  action  of  the  play  shows 
a  bias  towards  individuality  rather  than  law.  He  is  not  weak,  and 
if  necessary  can  be  severe  j  but  what  he  seems  to  love  in  each  case 
is  to  study  the  human  nature  of  the  persons  brought  before  him ; 
he  will  pooh-pooh  form  and  precedent  if  he  can,  with  humour  and 
rough  leniency,  find  some  practical  course  to  fit  the  special  case, 
and  give  everybody  another  chance.^  We  are  familiar  with  the 
idea  of  lynch  law :  in  Escalus  we  seem  to  have  lynch  mercy. 

When  we  turn  from  interest  of  personality  to  interest  of  action 
the  character  of  the  play  as  a  problem  with  its  solution  becomes 
much  more  clear.  We  find  in  Measure  for  Measure  perhaps  the 
purest  example  in  poetry  of  a  moral  experiment.  This  is  no  case 
of  a  crisis  arising  of  itself  in  the  course  of  human  events ;  the 
Duke,  in   his  withdrawal  from  Vienna,  is  designedly  contriving 

1 IV.  ii.  194.  «  II.  i,  from  41 ;  etc. 

2  IV.  ii.  89.  4  I.  i.  10.  6  E.g.  II.  i. 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  1 49 

special  conditions  in  which  he  will  be  able  to  study  the  workings 
of  human  nature.  But  the  scientific  experimenter  knows  that 
nature  is  infinitely  complex  in  its  operations ;  he  can  determine 
for  himself  what  forces  he  will  set  to  work,  but  as  to  the  mode  in 
which  they  will  manifest  themselves  he  must  be  prepared  for  the 
unexpected ;  he  must  watch  his  experiment,  use  means  to  ke^p  it 
within  the  channel  he  desires,  and  be  prepared  with  resources  to 
meet  what  may  arise  of  the  accidental.  Hence  the  Duke  does 
not  really  withdraw  from  his  city,  but  hovers  in  disguise  around 
the  experiment  he  has  set  in  motion ;  he  secretly  interferes  from 
time  to  time,  and  at  the  proper  moment  reveals  himself  and  ter- 
minates the  situation.  Both  the  complication  and  the  resolution 
of  the  plot  have  their  chief  motive  force  in  the  Duke. 

The  design  underlying  the  experiment  of  the  plot  rests  upon 
the  antithesis  of  the  law  and  the  individual ;  it  is  a  double  design, 
with  an  application  alike  to  the  dispensers  of  justice  and  to  its 
victims.  Imperfection  in  the  administration  of  justice  may  arise 
from  the  shortcomings  of  those  who  administer  it ;  moreover,  so 
deeply  does  precedent  enter  into  the  idea  of  law,  that  the  laxity 
of  the  past  gives  a  tinge  of  injustice  to  later  strictness.  This  is 
exactly  what  the  Duke  puts  to  his  confidant.^ 

Duke.     We  have  strict  statutes  and  most  biting  laws, 

The  needful  bits  and  curbs  to  headstrong  weeds, 

Which  for  this  nineteen  years  we  have  let  slip ; 

Even  like  an  o'ergrown  lion  in  a  cave, 

That  goes  not  out  to  prey.     Now,  as  fond  fathers. 

Having  bound  up  the  threatening  twigs  of  birch, 

Only  to  stick  it  in  their  children's  sight 

For  terror,  not  to  use,  in  time  the  rod 

Becomes  more  mock'd  than  fear'd ;  so  our  decrees, 

Dead  to  infliction,  to  themselves  are  dead ; 

And  liberty  plucks  justice  by  the  nose ; 

The  baby  beats  the  nurse,  and  quite  athwart 

Goes  all  decorum. 

1 1,  iii. 


150  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Friar.  It  rested  in  your  grace 

To  unloose  this  tied-up  justice  when  you  pleased : 
And  it  in  you  more  dreadful  would  have  seem'd 
Than  in  Lord  Angelo. 

Duke.  I  do  fear,  too  dreadful : 

Sith  'twas  my  fault  to  give  the  people  scope, 
'Twould  be  my  tyranny  to  strike  and  gall  them  * 

For  what  I  bid  them  do :  for  we  bid  this  be  done, 
When  evil  deeds  have  their  permissive  pass, 
And  not  the  punishment. 

Inspired  by  this  perplexity  the  Duke  has  installed  in  his  place  the 
two  magistrates  Angelo  and  Escalus,  representing  the  two  horns 
of  the  dilemma :  the  workings  of  unpitying  strictness  and  of  con- 
siderate clemency  are  to  be  studied  side  by  side.  Angelo  awakes 
"  all  the  enrolled  penalties  which  have  like  unscoured  armour  hung 
by  the  wall ; "  he  will  not  have  the  law  made  a  mere  scarecrow.^ 
Escalus,  urging  moderation,  addresses  himself  directly  to  the  per- 
sonality of  his  colleague ;  might  not  even  his  strictness  have 
yielded  had  he  been  subject  to  a  sorer  trial?     Angelo  answers : 

'Tis  one  thing  to  be  tempted,  Escalus, 

Another  thing  to  fall.     I  not  deny, 

The  jury,  passing  on  the  prisoner's  life, 

May  in  the  sworn  twelve  have  a  thief  or  two 

Guiltier  than  him  they  try.     What's  open  made  to  justice, 

That  justice  seizes  :  what  know  the  laws 

That  thieves  do  pass  on  thieves  ?  ^ 

Thus  the  characters  of  the  men  chosen  by  the  Duke  are  just  fitted 
for  bringing  out  one  element  in  the  experiment  —  the  relationship 
between  law  and  the  personality  of  those  who  administer  justice. 
But  the  personalities  of  those  on  whom  justice  is  to  be  exercised, 
not  less  than  the  characters  of  the  judges,  may  raise  the  conflict 
of  law  and  individuality.  Here  again  may  be  seen  opposite  bias 
in  the  colleagues  on  the  bench.  When  appeal  of  this  kind  is 
made  to  Angelo,  he  answers  : 

1  L  ii.  170;  H.  i.  I.  2  II.  i.  17. 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  151 

Condemn  the  fault,  and  not  the  actor  of  it? 

Why,  every  fault's  condemn'd  ere  it  be  done : 
Mine  were  the  very  cipher  of  a  function, 
To  fine  the  faults  whose  fine  stands  in  record, 
And  let  go  by  the  actor. 

Escalus  has  no  authority  to  interfere ;  but  he  feels  bitterly  the 
unequal  pressure  of  justice  on  different  individuals. 

Some  rise  by  sin,  and  some  by  virtue  fell : 

Some  run  through  brakes  of  vice,  and  answer  none ; 

And  some  condemned  for  a  fault  alone. ^ 

In  its  general  scope  then  the  experiment  of  the  Duke  is  clear 
and  simple  :  strictness  of  justice  and  lenity  are  to  be  set  separately 
to  work.  But  neither  the  Duke  nor  any  one  else  could  foresee 
the  exact  issues  that  would  arise  as  particular  cases  set  these  forces 
in  operation.  Scarcely  has  Vienna  been  left  to  its  new  deputies 
when  the  crime  of  Claudio  —  one  who  has  grossly  violated  the 
outward  form  of  law  while  he  is  true  to  its  spirit  —  brings  into  full 
play  the  opposing  principles :  Escalus  emphasises  the  extenua- 
ting circumstances,  Angelo  looks  only  at  the  offence.  But  this 
Claudio  has  a  sister  Isabella  who  pleads  with  Angelo  for  her 
brother :  at  once  new  moral  issues  appear  of  the  deepest  interest. 
The  first  affects  the  character  of  Angelo.    To  a  certain  extent  the 

Duke  had  foreseen  this. 

Angelo, 
There  is  a  kind  of  character  in  thy  life, 
That  to  th'  observer  doth  thy  history 
Fully  unfold.2 

The  expression  "  a  kind  of  character  "  seems  to  veil  a  slight  doubt 
in  the  ruler's  mind  as  to  what  the  outer  stamp  upon  the  Hfe  of 
Angelo  might  reveal  to  the  assayer ;  it  is  part  of  his  experiment 
that  the  possession  of  power  should  force  the  character  of  seeming 
precision  to  reveal  its  true  nature.    But  no  one  could  have  guessed 

1  II.  ii.  37;  H.  i.  38.  *Li.27. 


152  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

in  what  form  the  assaying  would  come  :  that  Angelo  should  be 
confronted  by  a  purity  as  zealous  as  his  own,  yet  wholly  different 
in  kind ;  to  use  Angelo's  own  word,  that  ^'  gravity "  should  be 
tempted  by  "gravity." 

What's  this,  what's  this?  is  it  her  fault  or  mine? 

The  tempter  or  the  tempted,  who  sins  most  ? 

Ha! 

Not  she ;  nor  doth  she  tempt :  but  it  is  I 

That,  lying  by  the  violet  in  the  sun, 

Do  as  the  carrion  does,  not  as  the  flower, 

Corrupt  with  virtuous  season.     Can  it  be 

That  modesty  may  more  betray  our  sense 

Than  woman's  lightness?     Having  waste  ground  enough, 

Shall  we  desire  to  raze  the  sanctuary 

And  pitch  our  evils  there  ?  .  .  .     What  is't  I  dream  on  ? 

O  cunning  enemy,  that,  to  catch  a  saint. 

With  saints  dost  bait  thy  hook !    Most  dangerous 

Is  that  temptation  that  doth  goad  us  on 

To  sin  in  loving  virtue  !  ^ 

As  Isabella  slowly  warms  to  her  work  of  interceding  for  Claudio 
her  womanly  intuition  penetrates  the  mystery  of  Angelo's  nature  ; 
with  the  insight  of  ideal  purity,  she  distinguishes  between  internal 
and  external  purity,  she  catches  Angelo's  zeal  for  the  cause,  his 
ambition  to  be  its  foremost  champion. 

So  you  must  be  the  first  that  gives  this  sentence, 
And  he  that  suffers.     O,  it  is  excellent 
To  have  a  giant's  strength  ;  but  it  is  tyrannous 
To  use  it  like  a  giant.^ 

By  the  mere  contact  then  of  Angelo  with  Isabella  a  double  effect 
has  been  produced :  Angelo  has  been  suddenly  revealed  to  him- 
self, and  is  being  gradually  revealed  to  Isabella.  And  with  all  this 
is  conjoined  another  moral  issue  of  high  interest :  Isabella's  own 
personaHty  has  been  drawn  into  the  area  of  experiment,  and  there 
is  distraction  in  her  soul  between  passionate  purity  and  brotherly 
love. 

1 II.  ii.  162.  2  II.  ii.  106,  and  whole  scene. 


MORAL   PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  1 53 

How  then  at  this  point  does  the  plot  of  the  play  stand,  consid- 
ered as  an  experiment  in  the  field  of  morals  ?  One  side  of  the 
design  has  been  fully  revealed  in  the  light  of  events  —  the  relation 
between  justice  and  the  character  of  the  judge  ;  and  the  conclu- 
sion of  the  third  act  can  moralise  in  the  style  of  an  epilogue  : 

He  who  the  sword  of  heaven  will  bear 
Should  be  as  holy  as  severe.^ 

But  this  stage  of  the  experiment  has  been  attained  only  at  the 
cost  of  a  great  moral  conflict :  Angelo  is  at  deadly  feud  with  An- 
gelo,  Isabella  the  nun  knows  not  how  to  be  true  to  Isabella  the 
sister  of  a  brother  Claudio ;  Claudio  himself  is  confronted  with 
the  fullest  vengeance  of  a  law  which,  of  all  such  offenders,  Claudio 
has  least  offended. 

Here  then  a  fresh  stage  in  the  plot  unfolds  itself:  the  experi- 
menter must  come  to  the  aid  of  his  own  experiment,  and  compli- 
cation passes  into  resolution.     The  soliloquy  just  quoted  proceeds  : 

Craft  against  vice  I  must  apply. 

The  expression  may  be  somewhat  startling,  for  fiction  has  accus- 
tomed us  to  associate  intrigue  with  purposes  of  evil ;  but  there  is 
no  reason  why  secret  agency  and  finesse  of  contrivance  may  not 
be  employed  in  the  service  of  good.  The  craft  of  the  Duke  is  of 
the  craftiest :  upon  a  grave  moral  crisis  and  impending  sin  of  An- 
gelo is  brought  to  bear  a  former  moral  error  of  the  same  man,  and 
so  used  that  the  one  is  averted  and  the  other  repaired. 

Duke.  Have  you  not  heard  speak  of  Mariana,  the  sister  of 
Frederick  the  great  soldier  who  miscarried  at  sea? 

Isab.  I  have  heard  of  the  lady,  and  good  words  went  with 
her  name. 

Duke.  She  should  this  Angelo  have  married ;  was  affianced 
to  her  by  oath,  and  the  nuptial  appointed :  between  which  time 
of  the  contract  and  limit  of  the  solemnity,  her  brother  Freder- 

1  III.  ii.  275. 


154  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

ick  was  wrecked  at  sea,  having  in  that  perished  vessel  the 
dowry  of  his  sister.  But  mark  how  heavily  this  befell  to 
the  poor  gentlewoman :  there  she  lost  a  noble  and  renowned 
brother,  in  his  love  toward  her  ever  most  kind  and  natural ; 
with  him  the  portion  and  sinew  of  her  fortune,  her  iparriage- 
dowry ;  with  both,  her  combinate  husband,  this  well-seeming 
Angelo. 

Isab.       Can  this  be  so?  did  Angelo  so  leave  her? 

Duke.  Left  her  in  tears,  and  dried  not  one  of  them  with  his  com- 
fort ;  swallowed  his  vows  whole,  pretending  in  her  discoveries 
of  dishonour :  in  few,  bestowed  her  on  her  own  lamentation, 
which  she  yet  wears  for  his  sake ;  and  he,  a  marble  to  her 
tears,  is  washed  with  them,  but  relents  not.^ 

By  the  substitution  of  Mariana  for  Isabella,  a  crime  committed 
in  intention  by  Angelo  is  made  to  redress  his  former  injury ;  a 
supposed  sin  of  Isabella  saves  her  tempter  from  actual  guilt ;  and 
further,  the  fancied  sin  is  the  price  of  salvation  for  Claudio. 

But  the  unforeseen  plays  a  part  in  all  experiment.  It  comes  as 
a  surprise,  and  yet  is  perfectly  true  to  nature,  that  Angelo,  in  moral 
revulsion  and  spiritual  turmoil  at  his  self-surrender  to  sin,  should 
plunge  from  one  crime  to  another,  from  fear  of  consequences 
basely  withholding  the  price  of  his  victim's  ruin,  and  secretly  has- 
tening the  execution  of  her  brother.^  The  Duke  must  find  some 
expedient  to  meet  this  :  he  intrigues  to  substitute  a  hardened 
criminal,  long  designated  for  well  deserved  execution,  instead  of 
the  Claudio  whom  over-rigorous  justice  was  demanding.  But  an 
obstacle  arises :  ^  at  the  last  moment  this  Barnardine  is  found  to 
be  in  a  reprobate  frame  of  mind,  utterly  unmeet  for  death.  The 
whole  experiment  is  threatened,  when  suddenly  accident  —  that 
plays  so  large  a  part  in  the  providence  of  Shakespeare — intervenes 
to  save. 

Provost.  Here  in  the  prison,  father. 

There  died  this  morning  of  a  cruel  fever 
One  Ragozine,  a  most  notorious  pirate, 

1  III.  i,  from  216.  2  IV.  H,  from  118.  8  iv.  iii,  from  70. 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  1 55 

A  man  of  Claudio's  years  ;  his  beard  and  head 
Just  of  his  colour.     Wliat  if  we  do  omit 
This  reprobate  till  he  were  well  inclined ; 
And  satisfy  the  deputy  with  the  visage 
Of  Ragozine,  more  like  to  Claudio  ? 
Duke.     O,  'tis  an  accident  that  heaven  provides! 

With  this  final  touch  craft  has  done  its  full  work  against  vice :  in 
all  but  the  outward  show  of  things,  reserved  for  the  final  scene, 
the  main  resolution  of  the  plot  is  complete. 

Meanwhile,  in  the  person  of  Escalus,  the  other  side  of  justice  is 
allowed  its  scope,  that  relaxes  law  in  order  to  study  the  individual, 
and  find  a  treatment  fitted  to  each  single  case ;  the  paternal  jus- 
tice, that  hopes  against  hope  for  the  reformation  of  the  sinner. 
Escalus  on  the  bench  has  evidently  a  keen  enjoyment  in  studying 
the  human  nature  in  front  of  him  ;  he  can  bandy  wit  with  low  hfe, 
and  meet  it  on  its  own  ground.^  The  fussy  constable  he  soothes, 
and  gently  leads  up  to  the  idea  that  society  has  been  doing  him  an 
injustice  in  burdening  him  so  long  with  office.  For  the  prisoners 
the  lenient  justice  of  Escalus  takes  two  forms.  The  first  is,  in  spite 
of  plain  guilt,  to  give  one  more  opportunity  of  amendment ;  but 
this  proves  vain  for  such  ingrained  evil  as  that  of  Overdone  and 
Pompey. 

Pompey.  Whip  me  ?     No,  no  ;  let  carman  whip  his  jade  : 
The  valiant  heart's  not  whipt  out  of  his  trade. 

Where  this  kind  of  leniency  has  failed,  there  is  yet  possible  mercy 
in  another  form  —  discrimination  of  character.  The  woman,  in 
whom  there  is  nothing  for  amendment  to  lay  hold  of,  is  left  to  her 
fate.^  But  Pompey,  whose  irrepressible  humour  reveals  some  depth 
of  soil  in  his  original  nature,  has  a  sphere  for  himself  even  in 
prison  life.  He  even  comes  to  be  promoted  —  promoted  to  the 
office  of  under-hangman  :  the  common  executioner  however  fears 
that  one  of  Pompey's  former  mode  of  life  "will  discredit  our 
mystery."  ^ 

in.i.  2111.  ji.  201.  8in.  ii;  IV.  ii. 


156  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF   SHAKESPEARE 

The  type  of  character  represented  in  Lucio  has  also  had  its  part 
in  the  action.  We  do  not  build  a  gallows  for  a  butterfly ;  it  satis- 
fies the  fitness  of  things  when  loose  humour  is  encountered  by  irony 
of  situation  :  here  is  a  jocose  problem  and  solution.  ^  Lucio, 
who  is  hail-fellow  with  all  men,  turns  his  light  wit  upon  the  strange 
Friar ;  the  raillery  that  spares  no  subject,  and  insists  upon  bringing 
everything  down  to  its  own  level,  plays  upon  the  character  of  the 
absent  Duke  —  how  "the  Duke  had  crotchets  in  him,"  how  he 
would  have  had  good  reason  for  dealing  differently  with  sins  like 
Claudio's. 

Duke.  Sir,  the  Duke  is  marvellous  little  beholding  to  your 
reports ;  but  the  best  is,  he  lives  not  in  them. 

Lucio.  Friar,  thou  knowest  not  the  Duke  so  well  as  I  do : 
he's  a  better  woodman  than  thou  takest  him  for. 

Duke.   Well,  you'll  answer  this  one  day.     Fare  ye  well. 

Lucio.  Nay,  tarry ;  Til  go  along  with  thee ;  I  can  tell  thee 
pretty  tales  of  the  Duke. 

Duke.  You  have  told  me  too  many  of  him  already,  sir,  if 
they  be  true  ;  if  not  true,  none  were  enough. 

Lucio.   I  was  once  before  him  — 

Lucio  proceeds  with  confidential  gaiety  to  blab  his  own  misdeeds, 
and  hands  justice  a  rod  with  which  to  scourge  him.  He  enters 
boisterously  into  the  excitement  of  the  final  scene,  enjoying  his 
own  audacity  as  he  puts  on  to  the  Friar  his  own  slanders  of  the 
Duke.  Then,  when  all  seems  to  go  against  this  mysterious 
stranger,  Lucio  is  the  first  to  lay  violent  hands  upon  him  and  pull 
off  his  hood :  levity  itself  gives  the  last  touch  that  brings  the 
shock  of  denouement  to  the  plot. 

Thou  art  the  first  knave  that  e'er  madest  a  Duke. 

Thus  the  complication  of  this  exquisite  plot  has  reached  its 
adequate  resolution;  the  moral  problem  has  been  fully  solved, 
and  the  reconciling  force  emerges  as  Mercy  in  its  many-sidedness. 

1 IV.  iii,  from  154 ;  V.  i. 


MORAL  PROBLEMS  DRAMATISED  1 57 

Angelo,  in  his  zealous  service  for  the  cause  of  purity,  has  encoun- 
tered a  shock,  reveaHng  to  him  that  he  is  not  pure ;  giving  his  sen- 
sual race  the  rein,  he  has  plunged  from  sin  to  sin.  All  the  while, 
unknown  to  him,  his  slighted  love  has  been  an  embodiment  of 
mercy,  by  dark  means  restoring  him  to  himself,  still  innocent  as 
regards  actions,  and  for  guilty  intentions  giving  the  hope  that  best 
men  may  be  moulded  out  of  faults.  Isabella,  cold  to  love  in  her 
passion  for  purity,  has  nevertheless  been  led  to  become  an  angel 
of  mercy  for  her  unhappy  brother,  while  for  herself  she  has,  with- 
out seeking,  found  in  the  Duke  a  power  that  will  make  purity  and 
passion  one.  Claudio  and  Juliet  by  their  sufferings  have  made 
atonement  to  the  letter  of  the  law  which  they  have  violated,  while 
they  were  true  to  its  spirit,  and  so  have  their  part  in  the  harmony 
of  mercy.  We  seem  to  see  a  reconciling  force  beneath  the  course 
of  events  as  we  behold  levity  encountered  by  irony ;  or  again,  as 
characters  that  have  sunk  to  the  depths  find  in  the  lowest  depth 
some  recognition  of  what  is  yet  good  in  them.  Surveying  from 
all  its  sides  this  drama  of  Justice  we  catch  a  majestic  presentation 
of  Mercy,  not  as  diluted  and  weakened  Justice,  but  as  something 
transcending  Justice,  holding  allegiance  equally  to  the  law  and  the 
individual,  giving  scope  for  the  warmth  of  passion  while  it  does 
reverence  to  the  light  of  purity.  What  Shakespeare  dramatises  in 
the  concrete,  Spenser  had  already  celebrated  in  ideal  form. 

For  if  that  virtue  be  of  so  great  might, 

Which  from  just  verdict  will  for  nothing  start, 

But,  to  preserve  inviolated  right, 
Oft  spills  the  principal  to  save  the  part : 
So  much  more,  then,  is  [Mercy]  of  power  and  art 

Which  seeks  to  save  the  subject  of  her  skill, 
Yet  never  doth  from  doom  of  right  depart ; 

As  it  is  greater  praise  to  save  than  spill, 

And  better  to  reform  than  to  cut  off  the  ill.^ 

1  Faerie  Queene,  V.  x.  2. 


VIII 

COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN   EQUILIBRIUM 

The  two  plays  treated  in  the  preceding  chapter  have  illustrated 
two  out  of  the  three  classes  into  which  the  Shakespearean  Drama 
is  ordinarily  divided  —  tragedy  and  comedy.  It  is  natural,  in  an 
attempt  to  survey  Shakespeare's  world  in  its  moral  complexity,  to 
ask,  What  is  tragedy?  and  what  is  comedy?  Possibly,  indeed, 
this  inquiry  might  legitimately  be  evaded.  It  is  not  certain  that 
the  descriptive  title  under  which  a  literary  work  is  announced  is 
a  part  of  the  literary  work  itself.  Obviously,  as  the  words  '  tragic,' 
*  comic  '  are  used  in  ordinary  conversation,  it  is  difficult  to  apply 
them  to  Shakespeare ;  what  can  be  less  comic  than  the  scene 
between  Isabella  and  her  brother  in  prison?  and  what  can  be 
more  comic  than  the  Fool  in  Lear?  Moreover,  a  possible 
explanation  for  the  misapplication  of  the  terms  is  ready  to  hand, 
Shakespeare  produced  his  plays  in  an  age  which  strove  to  adapt 
all  literature  to  the  forms  of  the  literature  of  Greece.  Now  in 
Greek  drama  the  distinction  of  tragedy  and  comedy  was  absolute  ; 
the  two  were  never  combined  in  the  same  representation,  and  the 
criticism  of  the  age  understood  the  difference  between  tragedy 
and  comedy  to  be  just  that  between  the  words  *  serious '  and 
'laughable.'^  It  would  be  entirely  in  keeping  with  the  general 
tendencies  of  Elizabethan  literature  that  two  terms  of  ancient 
drama  should  be  applied  in  a  modern  literature  where  they  might 
really  have  no  place.  Accordingly,  I  have  elsewhere  ^  advocated 
the  use  of  different  terms  to  express  the  divisions  of  the  Shake- 

1  Spoudaios  2indi  geloios. 

2  In  my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist,  page  372. 

158 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE   IN  EQUILIBRIUM  1 59 

spearean  drama.  But,  whether  the  terms  be  appropriate  or  not, 
the  classification  they  attempt  to  convey  is  a  real  one  :  to  examine 
the  principle  underlying  the  classification  is  the  object  of  this 
and  the  following  chapter. 

The  examination  here  attempted  must  be  distinguished  from 
another  treatment  of  the  subject  often  followed,  by  which  concep- 
tions of  tragedy  and  comedy  are  formed  from  first  principles  and 
the  nature  of  things,  and  then  particular  plays  are  tried  by  this 
conception  as  to  the  degree  to  which  they  satisfy  it.  All  such 
judicial  criticism  is  outside  the  scope  of  the  present  work :  we  are 
to  form  our  conceptions  of  Shakespearean  tragedy  and  comedy 
only  from  the  nature  and  contents  of  plays  so  designated.  But 
in  carrying  this  principle  into  operation  one  consideration  should 
be  borne  in  mind.  Every  species  Of  literature  is  the  heir  of  the 
whole  literary  past :  whatever  has  constituted  an  element  of 
dramatic  poetry  before  Shakespeare  may  possibly  reappear  in  the 
Shakespearean  Drama,  in  subordination  to  or  as  a  part  of  that  which 
gives  the  new  species  of  drama  its  distinctiveness.  A  rapid  review 
then  of  certain  earHer  forms  of  drama  and  kindred  literature  will 
make  a  favourable  position  from  which  to  undertake  our  specific 
inquiry  what  in  Shakespeare  is  tragedy,  and  what  is  comedy.  It 
will  be  convenient  to  begin  with  the  subject  of  comedy,  reserving 
tragedy  for  the  next  chapter. 

The  literary  evolution  of  which  Shakespeare  is  a  part  takes  its 
origin,  not  from  early  English  literature,  but  from  the  Hterature 
of  Greece.  In  primitive  Greek  fife,  at  a  time  when  all  kinds  of 
social  activity  found  literary  expression  in  some  form  of  ballad 
dance,  the  '  comus  '  was  the  ballad  dance  of  the  revel.^  The  same 
persons,  it  might  be,  who  at  one  part  of  the  day  had  in  the  stately 
and  restrained  dance  of  the  *  chorus '  breathed  their  adoration  to 
the  gods,  would  at  another  part  of  the  day  throw  off  restraint, 

1  The  origin  of  comedy  in  the  comus,  and  its  early  stages  of  development,  are 
treated  at  length  in  my  Ancient  Classical  Drama,  Chapter  VII,  and  subsequent 
chapters. 


l60  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

and,  wildly  dancing  hand  in  hand  through  a  whole  country  side, 
abandon  themselves  to  rhythmic  mirth  and  every  kind  of  boister- 
ous jollity.  All  that  the  comus  uttered  was  '  comedy ' :  thus  in 
its  ultimate  origin  the  whole  spirit  of  comedy  was  comprehended 
in  fun  and  self-abandonment.  Soon,  as  we  know,  a  modification 
took  place ;  the  custom  arose  of  halting  the  comus  dance  at  cross 
roads,  while  the  revellers  exchanged  bouts  of  chaff  and  popular 
badinage  with  one  another  and  with  passers-by;  here  we  get, 
not  fun  only,  but  fun  directed  against  an  object,  or  satire.  Yet 
another  modification  was  caused  by  the  peculiar  social  conditions 
of  ancient  Greece.  It  was  a  country  made  up  of  sharply  con- 
trasting states,  aristocratic  and  democratic.  Where  democratic 
institutions  prevailed  the  license  of  the  comus  would  know  no 
limits,  and  might  touch  everybody  and  everything  in  pubHc  or 
private  life.  Where,  on  the  other  hand,  aristocracy  was  supreme, 
it  is  easy  to  understand  how  popular  satire  would  be  restrained 
from  attacking  individuals  or  political  questions  ;  the  energies  of 
the  comus  would  be  concentrated  upon  satirising  human  nature 
in  general,  or  particular  classes  of  society.  Accordingly,  as  a 
matter  of  historic  fact,  the  aristocratic  states  of  Greece  and  its 
colonies  early  brought  into  prominence  a  form  of  comedy  depend- 
ing mainly  upon  social  satire,  the  ridiculing  of  the  quack,  or  the 
market  thief,  or  whatever  type  of  early  society  was  obnoxious 
to  popular  feeling :  in  literary  technicalities  this  is  *  caricature.' 
Thus  within  the  limits  of  primitive  literature  the  spirit  of  comedy 
already  appears  to  be  complex,  comprehending  the  three  elements 
of  fun,  satire,  and  caricature. 

The  evolution  of  comedy  next  brings  us  to  a  distinct  literary 
revolution,  which  gave  the  world  Old  Attic  Comedy  and  Aristoph- 
anes. This  revolution  consisted,  essentially,  in  the  fact  that 
comedy  came  to  imitate  the  structure  of  tragedy.  While  the 
former  was  a  rude  popular  sport,  tragedy  in  Greece  —  an  inter- 
weaving of  dramatic  scenes  on  the  stage  with  elaborate  choral 
odes  in  the  orchestra  —  had  become  a  solemn  religious  ceremo- 
nial, celebrated  with  great  magnificence  at  the  public  expense. 


COMEDY  AS  LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  l6l 

The  mode  by  which  a  tragic  representation  was  secured  was  ex- 
pressed by  the  technical  phrase  that  the  poet "  received  a  chorus  " 
from  the  magistrate ;  it  was  understood  that,  with  the  chorus,  all 
the  expenses  of  training  and  mounting  were  provided  for  him. 
Now,  a  phrase  of  Aristotle  in  his  historic  sketch  informs  us  that 
"  it  was  late  before  comedy  received  a  chorus."  The  history  un- 
derlying that  simple  statement  seems  to  have  been  this.  The 
comic  poets  would  naturally  desire  to  share  the  privileges  of  their 
brethren  of  tragedy;  if  they  had  applied  —  as,  logically,  they 
ought  to  have  done  —  for  a  comus,  the  magistrate  would  meet 
them  with  the  answer  that  there  was  no  precedent  for  equipping 
a  comus  at  the  public  expense ;  they  therefore  put  a  bold  face  on 
the  matter  and  requested  a  chorus,  and  at  length  from  some 
friendly  magistrate  obtained  it.  Once  a  comic  poet  had  ob- 
tained his  chorus  he  would  have  the  full  privileges  of  public  rep- 
resentation ;  only  of  course  he  must  use  the  chorus,  and  so  cast  his 
comedy  in  the  structural  form  of  dramatic  scenes  separated  by 
choral  odes.  It  is  true  that  the  chorus  —  most  stately  of  all  bal- 
lad dances  —  was  entirely  incongruous  with  comedy.  But  incon- 
gruity is  itself  a  comic  effect :  in  this  idea  we  get  the  distinctive 
spirit  of  the  Old  Attic  Comedy.  It  is  still,  what  earlier  comedy 
has  been,  wild  fun,  satire,  caricature;  but  in  structure  it  must 
alternate  and  combine  choral  songs  with  actor's  dialogue ;  above 
all,  the  presence  of  the  chorus  favours  the  sudden  change  from 
comic  to  serious,  from  popular  fun  to  elevated  poetry.  The  Clouds 
of  Aristophanes  burlesques  the  new  education  by  farcical  scenes 
representing  a  rough  lout,  and  his  son  an  effeminate  fop,  trying  to 
learn  the  new  methods  of  Socrates ;  as  part  of  the  burlesque  Soc- 
rates is  made  out  an  atheist,  worshipping  no  gods  except  the  virgin 
Clouds.  This  gives  opportunity  for  a  chorus  of  Clouds,  moving 
about  the  orchestra  with  delicate  dance  motions ;  they  take  a 
small  share  in  the  general  burlesque,  but  can  also  give  opportu- 
nity for  the  highest  lyrical  poetry,  embodying  exquisite  concep- 
tions of  cloud  hfe  :  how  — 


1 62  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Lightly  they  rest  on  the  time-honoured  crest  of  Olympus, 

environed  in  snow, 
Or  tread  the  soft  dance  mid  the  stately  expanse  of  old  Ocean, 

the  nymphs  to  beguile, 
Or  stoop  to  enfold  in  their  pitchers  of  gold  the  mystical  waves 

of  the  Nile ; 
Or  around  the  white  foam  of  Maeotis  they  roam,  or  Mimas 

all  wintry  and  bare. 

A  revolution  in  art  has  thus  introduced  a  new  element  into  liter- 
ature ;  the  conception  of  comedy  has  enlarged  to  take  in  the 
serious.  The  mixture  of  tones  —  sharp  contrasts  of  comic  and 
serious,  rudeness  and  poetic  elevation  —  has  obtained  an  estab- 
lished place  in  dramatic  literature. 

A  great  mass  of  Greek  literature,  representing  many  stages  in 
dramatic  evolution,  has  been  entirely  lost ;  when  comedy  is  next 
seen  it  is  in  the  hands  of  the  Romans.  As  we  might  expect,  this 
Roman  comedy  exhibits  a  great  change  from  the  old  Attic  type. 
We  are  not  concerned  here  with  structural  change,  such  as  the 
loss  of  the  chorus,  which  has  left  in  its  place  some  metrical  flexi- 
bility and  a  tendency  towards  moralising.  But  in  its  general 
spirit  Roman  comedy,  without  losing  the  old,  has  admitted  a 
new  element ;  it  is  dominated  by  what  is  among  the  most  per- 
manent of  all  Hterary  interests  —  the  interest  of  story.  The  term 
*  story '  may  cover  any  narrative  of  events ;  but  story  par  excellence 
is  seen  where  the  succession  of  incidents  moves  in  the  form  of 
complication  and  resolution.  These  terms  seem  to  explain  them- 
selves. To  take  illustration  from  story  in  its  simplest  form.  An 
anecdote  tells  of  a  disappointed  lover  wishing  to  commit  suicide, 
only  he  is  deterred  by  fear  —  not  fear  of  dying,  but  of  failing  to 
die.  At  last,  grown  more  desperate,  he  provides  himself  with  a 
pistol,  a  rope,  a  phial  of  poison,  and  a  box  of  matches,  and  he 
climbs  to  a  precipice  overhanging  the  sea.  He  fastens  the  rope 
to  a  projecting  tree  and  puts  the  loop  round  his  neck;  then  he 
loads  the  pistol,  swallows  the  poison,  strikes  the  matches  and  puts 
them  in  his  bosom,  jumps  off  the  precipice,  and  fires  at  his  fore- 


COMEDY  AS  LIFE  IN   EQUILIBRIUM  I63 

head  as  he  jumps.  We  have  complication  enough  of  suicide  when 
a  man  is  being  at  once  hanged,  poisoned,  shot,  and  burned,  to  say 
nothing  of  a  death  by  drowning  suggested  from  below.  Resolu- 
tion of  this  complication  is  found  in  the  simple  circumstance  that 
the  aim  of  the  pistol  was  bad,  that  the  ball  severed  the  rope  and 
the  man  fell  into  the  sea,  which  put  out  the  fire,  while  the  tossing 
on  the  waves  before  he  could  get  to  shore  made  the  unhappy  man 
vomit  the  poison,  so  that  he  found  himself  alive  after  all.  This 
device  of  leading  events  into  a  complication  only  that  the  compli- 
cation may  be  resolved  makes  one  of  the  most  prominent  forms 
of  story  interest  for  all  literature.  In  Roman  comedy  it  is  the 
pure  interest  of  story,  simple  or  complicated,  which  is  supreme. 
The  older  elements  of  comedy  are  not  lost :  there  is  the  mixture 
of  burlesque  scenes  with  serious  moralising;  there  is  plenty  of 
satire  and  broad  fun;  and  caricature  is  seen  enlarged  by  three 
specially  Roman  types,  of  the  parasite  (or  diner-out),  the  saucy 
slave  joking  old  jokes  like  a  modern  clown,  and  the  sharper.  But 
these  interests  belong  to  details,  or  tend  to  make  a  separate  un- 
derplot ;  the  main  plot  rests,  not  upon  the  fun  or  extravagance  of 
the  matter,  but  upon  the  interest  of  the  story  itself  with  its  com- 
plication and  resolution.  The  Captives  of  Plautus  presents  a 
father  using  his  wealth  to  purchase  prisoners  of  war,  in  order  that 
he  may  have  wherewith  to  make  exchange  for  his  own  son,  who 
has  recently  been  taken  prisoner  by  the  enemy.  Among  his  pur- 
chases is  a  certain  master  with  his  slave ;  in  reality  the  slave  is 
another  son  of  the  same  father  stolen  away  in  childhood :  already 
we  have  the  complication  of  a  father  unconsciously  holding  his 
own  son  as  a  slave.  The  complication  increases  as  the  captive 
master  and  slave  arrange  secretly  to  exchange  positions,  so  that 
the  slave  (supposed  to  be  the  master)  may  be  retained,  while  the 
real  master  (supposed  to  be  the  slave)  is  sent  away  into  the  ene- 
my's country  to  arrange  for  ransom.  In  time  the  father  discovers 
the  fraud  that  has  been  put  upon  him,  and  in  anger  dooms  the 
remaining  captive  (his  own  son  in  fact)  to  the  hard  labour  of  the 
quarries.    The  resolution  comes  with  the  return  of  the  other  son, 


1 64  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

duly  ransomed,  and  at  the  same  time  the  arrival  of  the  runaway 
slave  who  had  years  ago  stolen  the  child :  through  the  latter  the 
identity  of  this  stolen  child  with  the  captive  doomed  to  the  quar- 
ries is  made  known,  and  all  ends  happily.  The  working  out  "of 
this  compHcation  and  resolution  is  the  main  business  of  the  play ; 
but  through  its  scenes  there  flits  a  parasite  of  the  usual  type,  with 
monstrous  caricature  of  eating  powers  and  social  servility ;  he  is 
given  a  slight  connection  with  the  main  business  in  being  the  first 
to  announce  the  return  of  the  son.  from  captivity,  for  which  he 
claims  free  quarters  in  the  household  for  life.  A  main  plot  with 
interest  of  story,  and  an  underplot  of  caricature,  make  this  a 
typical  Roman  comedy. 

The  comedy  then  of  ancient  literature  embraced  all  these  in- 
terests of  fun,  satire,  caricature,  the  intermingling  of  serious  with 
gay  matter,  and,  to  crown  all,  the  supreme  interest  of  story  with 
its  complication  and  resolution.  One  remark  must  be  added. 
Partly  through  connection  of  primitive  drama  with  religious  ritual, 
and  partly  through  mechanical  difficulties  of  early  stage  repre- 
sentation, the  ancient  drama  was  limited  to  a  single  scene.  Lack- 
ing the  device  of  scene-changing,  ancient  comedy  was  prevented 
from  presenting  the  whole  course  of  a  story ;  it  could  put  on  the 
stage  only  the  end  or  the  crisis  of  the  story,  leaving  other  parts 
of  it  to  be  inferred  or  suggested  indirectly.  In  technical  phrase, 
the  whole  of  ancient  comedy  was  comedy  of  situation  :  its  move- 
ment was  an  opening  situation  of  complication  developed  to  a 
resolution.  And  this  kind  of  movement  has  come  to  be  called 
*  classical,'  to  distinguish  it  from  movement  of  an  opposite  type, 
such  as  we  find  in  Shakespeare  and  romantic  drama. 

Between  the  close  of  the  ancient  drama  and  the  Elizabethan 
age  there  intervenes  a  vast  gulf  of  time  :  the  Roman  empire, 
with  its  Greek- Roman  literature,  is  slowly  passing  into  the  civilisa- 
tion of  modern  Europe,  but  passing  through  *  dark  ages,'  in  which 
literature  and  art  and  the  higher  culture  seem  in  danger  of  being 
lost  in  a  social  chaos,  while  the  one  civilisation  which  has  fallen 
into  decay  is  grappling  with  the  other  civilisation  not  yet  emerged 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  165 

from  barbarism.  Among  other  changes  of  this  period  drama 
ceases  to  be  a  vital  form  of  literature  ;  the  stage  gives  place  to  the 
minstrel  as  the  purveyor  of  popular  amusement,  and  instead  of 
acted  story  we  get  story  narrated.  At  the  same  time  story  be- 
comes, more  than  at  any  other  time,  the  dominant  interest  in 
literature.  The  minstrels  were  a  wandering  class,  passing  from 
place  to  place  and  from  people  to  people,  and  drawing  the  mytho- 
logical stores  of  all  nations  into  a  common  stock ;  the  dark  ages 
became  a  vast  gathering  ground  for  stories  of  all  kinds  —  stories 
long  and  short,  epic  and  anecdote,  serious  tales  and  funny,  narra- 
tives sacred  and  profane.  From  the  fact  that  such  stories  passed 
from  spoken  into  written  literature  at  a  time  when  the  Romance 
languages  were  in  process  of  formation,  the  term  *  romance'  has 
come  to  describe  the  mediaeval  accumulation  of  story  lore. 

In  several  points  the  phenomena  of  this  romance  are  important 
for  their  bearing  on  the  literature  of  the  future.  To  this  period 
we  are  indebted  for  the  immense  accentuation  of  story  among  the 
leading  interests  of  literature  —  the  interest  of  story  for  story's 
sake,  apart  from  the  mode  in  which  it  is  presented.  Again, 
romance  gives  us,  not  merely  multiplication,  but  also  aggregation 
of  stories :  Hterary  interest  is  felt  in  interweaving  many  different 
tales  into  a  system.  Sometimes  a  common  moral  purpose,  as  in 
the  Gesta  Romanorum  or  Gower's  Lover's  Confession^  will  be 
made  an  excuse  for  a  collection  of  stories.  Or,  one  introductory 
tale  will  ingeniously  be  treated  as  a  thread  on  which  to  string  any 
number  of  other  tales  :  the  Arabian  Nights  and  Canterbury  Tales 
are  familiar  examples.  But  the  most  important  influence  of 
romance  in  the  evolution  of  literature  was  the  fact  that  it  set  free 
story  from  the  limitations  imposed  upon  it  by  the  ancient  stage ; 
instead  of  being  cramped  into  the  one  form  of  a  complicated 
situation  resolving,  the  stories  of  romance  were  free  to  follow 
natural  movement,  and  exhibit  the  whole  course  of  events  from 
beginning  to  end. 

Yet  another  of  the  phenomena  of  romance  is  to  be  noted,  which 
has  a  more  immediate  bearing  upon  the  subject  of  the  present 


1 66  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

chapter.  'Tragedy'  and  *  comedy*  passed  into  romance  as  terms 
for  narrated  stories,  and  gradually  a  considerable  amount  of  change 
came  over  the  relative  signification  of  the  two  words.  Originally, 
in  Greek  drama,  tragedy  and  comedy  were  distinct  things,  the 
one  serious,  the  other  amusing.  Later,  even  within  the  Hmits  of 
classical  drama,  we  have  seen  how  comedy  enlarged  its  meaning 
and  allowed  the  serious  to  mingle  with  the  ludicrous.  When  all 
limitation  due  to  connection  with  particular  festivals  was  removed, 
the  stories  of  romance  would  be  still  freer  to  follow  human  life  in 
the  mixture  of  tones,  Hght  and  dark  drawn  closer  together  in 
tragedies  and  comedies  alike.  But  a  more  specific  change  came 
about,  that  was  destined  to  influence  greatly  the  drama  of  the 
future.  Fashion  is  a  potent  factor  in  art ;  in  the  latter  part  of  the 
romance  period  a  certain  type  of  story  came  into  fashion,  and 
more  and  more  maintained  its  hold  on  the  popular  mind.  It 
found  expression  in  collection  after  collection  of  story  lore,  per- 
haps the  most  characteristic  of  which  belongs  to  a  later  period  — 
the  Mirror  for  Magistrates.  Under  this  name  appeared,  one 
after  another,  encyclopaedias  of  stories,  all  cast  in  one  mould ; 
the  word  'magistrate'  was  applied  to  one  who  had  held  any 
exalted  station,  and  the  interest  of  the  story  lay  in  his  fall  from 
this  exaltation.  Greatness  fallen  had  become  the  most  popular 
theme  of  story  in  a  story  age.  Gradually  the  word  'tragedy,' 
though  no  doubt  it  could  still  be  used  of  any  serious  story,  came 
more  and  more  in  the  popular  mind  to  suggest  this  overpowering 
interest  of  an  exaltation  and  a  fall.  And,  as  tragedy  was  becom- 
ing speciahsed  in  its  significance,  in  the  same  proportion  the  cor- 
relative word  'comedy'  was  enlarging  to  take  in  any  story  that 
was  not,  in  the  newer  sense,  a  tragedy.  This  accounts  for  the 
curious  circumstance  that  the  most  profoundly  serious  story  ever 
composed,  a  story  leading  us  through  hell,  purgatory,  and  paradise, 
could  be  entitled  by  Dante  *  The  Divine  Comedy ' :  to  mediaeval 
ears  this  need  suggest  no  more  than  '  The  Divine  Story.' 

Shakespeare  belongs  to  the  Romantic  Drama ;  that  is  to  say,  to 
the   amalgamation  of  drama  and  romance.     The   Renaissance 


COMEDY  AS  LIFE   IN   EQUILIBRIUM  1 6/ 

terminated  the  dark  ages  by  bringing  fully  to  light  the  Hterature 
of  ancient  Greece  and  Rome.  The  masterpieces  of  this  literature 
were  spread  over  western  Europe,  and  inspired  new  literary  cre- 
ation. The  magnificent  dramas  of  antiquity  became  models  for 
Elizabethan  playwrights :  "  Seneca  could  not  be  too  heavy  for 
them,  nor  Plautus  too  Hght."  But  the  matter  which  they  under- 
took to  dramatise  was  taken  from  the  story  books  of  romance,  in- 
cluding the  chronicle  histories  which  were  treated  as  romances : 
here  is  found  the  other  constituent  element  of  Elizabethan  drama. 
The  influence  of  romance,  with  its  long  hold  on  the  popular  mind, 
was  not  less  powerful  than  the  inspiration  upon  the  dramatists  of 
the  classical  models ;  in  a  Shakespearean  play  it  is  clear  that  the 
purpose  to  lead  up  to  dramatic  situations  and  effects  is  not  more 
prominent  than  the  purpose  to  do  justice  to  the  story  for  its  own 
sake.  When  romantic  dramas  are  compared  with  the  classical 
dramas  of  antiquity,  it  is  easy  to  see  how  the  powerful  influence 
of  romance  has  been  able  to  sweep  away  all  the  Hmitations  of  the 
old  dramatic  form;  how  there  is  no  longer  any  obstacle  to  the 
free  intermingling  of  serious  and  light  tones ;  how  stage  repre- 
sentation has  had  to  adapt  itself  to  romantic  interest,  and,  by  free 
multiplication  of  scenes,  with  intervals  between  the  scenes,  make 
provision  for  presenting  the  whole  course  of  a  story  fi-om  begin- 
ning to  end. 

We  are  now  in  a  position  to  take  up  the  main  question  of  this 
chapter  :  What  is  the  Shakespearean  conception  of  comedy?  We 
may  expect  to  find  that  it  will  comprehend  all  that  has  been  an 
element  of  comedy  in  the  past ;  further,  that  its  distinctiveness 
will  rest  upon  the  union  of  drama  with  romance.  The  conception 
may  be  formulated  under  two  heads,  which  can  be  treated  sepa- 
rately. For  the  first,  we  may  say  that  Comedy  in  Shakespeare  is 
story  raised  to  its  highest  power. 

Even  in  Roman  Comedy  the  interest  of  story  was  supreme ;  the 
romance  of  the  dark  ages  not  only  emphasised  this  interest,  but 
also  widened  the  meaning  of  the  word  *  comedy' until  it  became 


1 68  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

almost  equivalent  to  '  story.*  In  Shakespeare  story  is  raised  to  the 
highest  power  as  the  harmony  of  many  stories.  Plot  in  romantic 
drama  differs  from  classical  plot  as  harmony  in  music  differs  from 
unison;  it  is  a  federation  of  several  stories,  any  one  of  which 
would  have  made  a  whole  plot  for  an  ancient  dramatist.  Tke 
Merchant  of  Venice  furnishes  a  simple  illustration.  Here  we  have 
two  main  stories,  taken  from  distinct  books  of  romance  well  known 
at  the  time.  One  is  the  story  of  the  cruel  Jew  :  how  a  Christian 
merchant  came  to  enter  into  a  bond  with  a  Jewish  creditor  the 
terms  of  which  involved  a  pound  of  the  debtor's  flesh ;  how  the 
bond  came  to  be  forfeited  ;  how  at  the  last  moment  it  was  pointed 
out  that  no  provision  had  been  made  for  the  shedding  of  blood, 
and  on  this  pretext  the  bond  was  upset.  The  other  is  the  story 
of  the  caskets  :  that  a  father  bequeathed  his  daughter's  hand  and 
fortune  to  the  suitor  who  should  make  the  right  choice  between 
three  caskets ;  that  many  failed,  but  the  real  lover  chose  the 
right  casket  and  won  the  maiden.  The  two  stories  are  inter- 
woven by  Shakespeare  in  this  manner :  he  makes  the  desire  to 
assist  Bassanio,  the  lover  in  the  caskets  story,  the  motive  of  An- 
tonio, the  merchant  of  the  other  story,  in  his  entering  into  the 
strange  bond ;  while  Portia,  the  maiden  of  the  caskets,  is  the  dis- 
guised judge  who  upsets  the  bond  and  saves  the  merchant ;  two 
stories  could  not  be  more  neatly  interwoven  than  when  the  hero 
of  the  one  is  the  complicating  force  of  the  other,  and  the  heroine 
of  the  one  the  resolving  force  of  the  other.  But  the  plot  of  The 
Merchant  of  Venice  includes  more  stories  than  these.  There  is 
the  story  of  the  betrothal  ring :  how  a  betrothed  maiden  happens, 
when  in  disguise,  to  meet  her  lover,  and  entices  from  him  his 
betrothal  ring ;  returning  to  him  in  her  proper  guise  she  teases 
him  for  a  while,  and  then  the  mystery  is  explained.  The  inter- 
weaving of  this  third  story  with  the  other  two  is  on  this  wise : 
Portia's  appearance  as  a  judge  in  the  Venetian  court,  however 
grand  a  thing  in  itself,  gives  a  touch  of  the  masculine  at  the 
moment  to  her  character ;  between  this  and  the  end  of  the  play  is 
inserted  this  girlish  frolic  of  the  ring  mystery,  and  the  heroine's 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  1 69 

character  is  felt  to  be  exquisitely  balanced  before  the  curtain  falls. 
Again,  place  is  found  in  the  plot  for  a  fourth  story.  The  story  of 
the  Jew  involves  an  interval  of  three  months  between  the  signing 
of  the  bond  and  its  falling  due ;  instead  of  supposing  an  interval 
between  the  acts,  Shakespeare  introduces  a  new  interest  —  the 
elopement  of  Jessica  the  Jew's  daughter  with  the  Christian 
Lorenzo,  and  thus  fills  the  gap  of  three  months  with  a  succession 
of  busy  scenes,  converting  a  weakness  into  a  strength.  These 
four  distinct  stories  move  side  by  side  through  the  scenes  of  the 
play,  supporting  one  another  by  a  sort  of  dramatic  counterpoint, 
like  the  four  parts  of  a  musical  harmony.  In  reahty,  the  plot  of 
The  Merchant  of  Ve7iice  is  even  more  complex  than  this,  and  two 
out  of  the  four  stories  are  duplicated  :  not  only  Portia,  but  also 
her  maid  Nerissa  has  an  adventure  with  a  betrothal  ring ;  just  as 
the  Jew's  daughter  is  wedded  to  a  Christian  husband,  so  his 
roguish  servant  Launcelot  is  transferred  to  Christian  service.^ 

A  Shakespearean  comedy  then  is  a  harmony  of  many  stories. 
But,  while  the  term  may  mean  a  simple  sequence  of  events,  we 
have  seen  that  story  par  excellence  is  found  where  the  move- 
ment leads  us  through  a  complication  of  affairs  to  a  resolution. 
Hence  it  is  natural  to  find  that  a  large  proportion  of  the  stories  in 
Shakespeare's  plots  are  complicated  and  resolved.  Such  compli- 
cation and  resolution  may  take  a  great  variety  of  different  forms. 
Sometimes  we  have  *  error '  —  that  is,  mistaken  identity  —  and 
the  recognition  that  ends  it :  Plautus  had  made  a  plot  out  of  the 
confusion  between  two  twin  brothers,  the  Comedy  of  Errors  du- 
plicates the  entanglement  by  giving  the  twin  brothers  slaves  who 
are  twins.  Sometimes  we  have  folly  and  its  exposure  :  Parolles 
moves  through  the  scenes  of  AWs  Well  That  End^s  Well  posing  as 
a  hero  and  man  of  military  erudition,  until  a  conspiracy  betrays  him 
in  his  real  character  as  a  coward  and  a  fool.  Or  the  complication 
may  consist  in  peril  and  the  resolution  in  release  :  ^geon  in  the 
Comedy  of  Errors  stands  in  danger  of  his  life  up  to  the  point 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  plot  in  the  Appendix,  below,  page  347. 


I/O  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

where  accident  brings  salvation  as  he  is  on  his  way  to  the  block. 
Play  after  play  will  give  examples  of  the  complication  of  intrigue, 
to  which  the  resolution  may  come  either  in  the  form  of  success  or 
confusion.  We  have  seen  in  Winter's  Tale  and  Cymbeline  how  a 
plot  may  be  founded  on  moral  fall  and  restoration ;  in  Measure 
for  Measure  on  a  moral  problem  and  its  solution.  Complication 
and  resolution  is  an  abstract  idea,  which  may  manifest  itself  in  any 
number  of  different  concrete  forms. 

The  intensification  of  story  interest  in  Shakespearean  comedy 
goes  further  still.  Not  only  do  we  find  individual  stories  that 
enter  into  a  plot  comphcated  and  resolved  :  we  further  find  clash 
and  disentanglement  between  these  complicated  and  resolved 
stories;  more  even  than  this,  analysis  can  sometimes  trace  how 
there  is  clash  and  disentanglement  between  these  clashes  of  stories. 
This  can  be  made  clear  only  by  a  somewhat  detailed  analysis  of 
particular  plays. 

The  main  plot  of  Twelfth  Night^  is  a  complex  story  of  love  : 
that  particular  type  of  love  which  in  Elizabethan  drama  is  called 
fancy,  where  some  waywardness  or  whim,  or  perhaps  accident,  has 
had  much  to  do  with  determining  choice.  Three  personages 
appear :  Orsino  the  duke,  Olivia  the  heiress,  and  Viola,  the  ship- 
wrecked girl  who  for  safety  takes  the  disguise  of  a  page.  Each 
of  the  three  is  the  centre  of  a  love  story ;  in  each  case  the  love  is 
complicated  by  rejection,  yet  attains  a  happy  conclusion.  Any 
one  of  these  three  loves  could  be  separated  from  the  rest  of  the 
play,  and  narrated  as  a  complete  story  in  itself.  In  the  actual  plot 
however  the  three  love  stories  are  made  to  clash  together  into  a 
common  entanglement,  owing  to  the  mistaken  identity  of  the  girl 
taken  for  a  page.  Viola  has  no  sooner  entered  as  a  page  into  the 
service  of  the  Duke  than  she  secretly  falls  in  love  with  her  master ; 
the  Duke  has  long  been  in  love  with  the  heiress  Olivia,  who  will 
have  nothing  to  do  with  him,  but  mopes  in  solitude ;  when  the 
Duke  sends  his  pretty  page  with  messages  of  love  to  his  mistress, 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  plot  in  the  Appendix,  below,  page  340. 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  1 71 

this  is  not  more  cruel  to  the  disguised  Viola  than  fatal  to  Olivia, 
who  at  once  falls  hopelessly  in  love  with  the  messenger  page. 
Three  separate  loves  have  clashed  into  a  triangular  duel  of  disap- 


pointed fancy :  Orsino  in  love  with  Olivia,  Olivia  in  love  with 
Viola,  Viola  in  love  with  Duke  Orsino.  The  disentanglement 
comes  when  a  twin  brother  of  Viola,  Sebastian,  appears  on  the 
scene  :  Olivia  unconsciously  transfers  her  fancy  to  this  Sebastian, 
and  is  married  before  she  discovers  her  mistake ;  Orsino,  having 
lost  Olivia,  is  free  to  receive  the  love  of  Viola  when  she  appears  as 


jjrot've 


a  girl ;  and  Viola's  secret  love  can  be  confessed  when  her  brother's 
arrival  leads  her  to  drop  her  disguise.  The  triangular  duel  has 
resolved  into  a  parallelogram  of  the  forces  of  love  and  kinship  : 
two  happy  couples,  a  pair  of  friends  who  could  not  be  lovers, 
a  brother  and  a  sister.  The  main  plot  then  of  this  play  has 
appeared  as  a  clash,  due  to  mistakes  of  identity,  with  subsequent 
disentanglement,  between  three  love  stories,  each  of  which,  looked 
at  in  itself,  is  complicated  and  resolved. 

The  underplot  of  the  play  is  totally  different  in  matter,  but 
identical  in  form.  Instead  of  a  triangular  duel  in  love  we  have  a 
triplet  of  follies.  Somewhat  after  the  fashion  of  the  moral  scale 
of  wrongs  already  noted  in  Cymbeline}  we  have  in  this  play  a  grad- 

1  Above,  page  77. 


1/2  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

uation  of  the  folly  —  three  types  that  make  a  descending  scale 
as  viewed  from  the  standpoint  of  the  natural.  Sir  Toby  Belch 
(with  whom  may  be  classed  Maria)  exhibits  the  natural  fooling 
which  seems  no  more  than  a  vent  for  health  and  high  spirit.  Sir 
Andrew  Aguecheek  joins  in  the  folly :  but  in  this  case  we  have, 
not  a  genuine  article,  but  a  wretched  imitation.  When  Sir  Toby 
will  follow  the  mischievous  Maria  "  to  the  gates  of  Tartar,"  Sir 
Andrew  puts  in  his  "  I'll  make  one  too  :  "  the  single  phrase  sums 
up  all  there  is  in  this  imitative  folly,  strugghng,  without  any  sense 
of  the  ludicrous,  to  copy  the  outside  ways  of  funny  people,  and 
laboriously  learn  to  be  gay.  At  a  still  further  remove  from  what  is 
natural  we  may  place  Malvolio's  artificial  antagonism  to  frivolity ; 
—  artificial,  for  care  is  taken  to  show  that  Malvolio  is  no  genuine 
precisian. 

The  devil  a  puritan  that  he  is,  or  anything  constantly,  but  a 
time-pleaser ;  an  affectioned  ass,  that  cons  state  without  book 
and  utters  it  by  great  swarths  :  the  best  persuaded  of  himself, 
so  crammed,  as  he  thinks,  with  excellencies,  that  it  is  his 
grounds  of  faith  that  all  that  look  on  him  love  him.i 

Each  of  these  three  types  makes  a  separate  story  of  folly  and  its 
exposure.  Sir  Toby,  by  sheer  force  of  boisterous  jollity,  domi- 
nates the  scenes  until  his  practical  joking  is  tried  on  a  stouter  man 
than  himself;  the  imitator  Aguecheek  as  usual  is  with  him,  and 
both  encounter  the  same  shock. 

Olivia.   Whaf s  the  matter? 

Sir  And.  He  has  broke  my  head  across  and  has  given  Sir 
Toby  a  bloody  coxcomb  too  :  for  the  love  of  God,  your  help ! 
I  had  rather  than  forty  pound  I  were  at  home.^ 

For  Sir  Toby  and  his  natural  folly  exposure  ends  in  nothing 
worse  of  penance  than  marriage  with  the  maid  Maria ;  the  paltry 
imitator  has  the  ignoble  end  of  being  cast  off  even  by  his  model, 
who  calls  him  an  ass-head  and  a  coxcomb  and  a  gull.  For  the 
folly  of  Malvolio,  that  runs  so  counter  to  ordinary  human  nature, 

1  Twelfth  Night :  II.  iii.  159.  2  v.  i.  178. 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN   EQUILIBRIUM  1 73 

a  far  worse  fate  is  reserved :  his  self-importance  is  played  upon  by 
a  deep  conspiracy,  and  he  is  led  to  come,  cross-gartered  and  in 
yellow  stockings,  into  his  mistress's  presence  and  smile  his  un- 
gainly courtship,  until  he  has  to  be  put  in  restraint,  while  his 
indignant  protests  are  read  ingeniously  as  symptoms  of  madness. 
But  these  three  stories  of  folly  are  not  separate  in  the  plot  of  the 
play :  two  of  them  are  seen  to  clash  with  the  third,  as  Toby, 
Maria  and  Aguecheek  devise  the  conspiracy  against  Malvolio,  the 
more  natural  of  the  follies  uniting  against  that  which  is  wholly  un- 
natural :  ^  this  clash  of  stories  finds  its  disentanglement  only  in  the 
mutual  explanations  which  conclude  the  drama.  The  underplot,  hke 
the  main  plot,  is  seen  to  exhibit  a  clash  and  disentanglement  between 
three  stories,  each  of  which  is  itself  complicated  and  resolved. 

Already  in  this  play  we  have  two  distinct  systems  of  stories, 
a  main  plot  and  an  underplot,  and  each  in  itself  is  a  clash  between 
three  complicated  stories.  The  entanglement  increases  as  the 
two  systems  are  brought  into  conflict,  the  underplot  clashing  with 
the  main  plot.  Sir  Toby  is  forever  drawing  out  the  unconscious 
absurdity  of  Aguecheek,  having  as  his  hold  upon  him  Aguecheek's 
absurd  pretensions  to  the  hand  of  Olivia.  At  one  point  Sir  Toby 
sees  his  chance  in  the  handsome  youth  who  comes  backward  and 
forward  between  the  Duke  and  Olivia :  this  is  of  course  the  Viola 
of  the  main  plot.^  Sir  Andrew  is  instantly  given  to  understand 
that  this  youth  is  his  rival. 

She  did  show  favour  to  the  youth  in  your  sight  only  to 
exasperate  you,  to  awake  your  dormouse  valour,  to  put  fire  in 
your  heart,  and  brimstone  in  your  liver.  You  should  then 
have  accosted  her;  and  with  some  excellent  jests,  fire-new 
from  the  mint,  you  should  have  banged  the  youth  into  dumb- 
ness. This  was  looked  for  at  your  hand,  and  this  was  balked  : 
the  double  gilt  of  this  opportunity  you  let  time  wash  off,  and 
you  are  now  sailed  into  the  north  of  my  lady's  opinion ;  where 
you  will  hang  like  an  icicle  on  a  Dutchman's  beard,  unless  you 
do  redeem  it  by  some  laudable  attempt. 

1 II.  iii,  from  144.  2  From  III.  ii. 


174  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Sir  Andrew  is  worked  up  to  the  point  of  sending  a  challenge. 
The  scheme  is  better  than  Sir  Toby  knows  :  the  swagger  of  page- 
hood is  easy  to  Viola  as  long  as  she  is  only  a  messenger,  but,  when 
it  comes  to  fighting,  the  feminine  that  is  inside  the  page  exterior 
begins  to  quake.  The  fun  goes  merrily  on  :  two  parties  are  being 
drawn  into  a  duel,  each  a  coward  at  heart,  each  persuaded  of 
the  terrible  rage  and  valour  of  the  other,  persuaded  also  that  the 
only  chance  is  to  make  some  show  of  fight.  But  the  joke  is  not 
all  on  one  side  :  the  twin  brother  of  Viola  appears,  and  Sir  Andrew 
is  valiant  enough  to  strike  him,  with  unlooked  consequences  to 
himself,  and  to  Sir  Toby  who  comes  to  his  prot^g^'s  rescue.^  In 
these  representative  personages  the  underplot  is  in  full  conflict 
with  the  main  plot,  and  the  entanglement  crescendoes,  until  the 
dropping  of  Viola's  disguise  makes  the  general  denouement. 

Thus  in  this  play  of  Twelfth  Night  the  ultimate  elements  of 
plot  are  a  number  of  single  stories,  each  complicated  and  re- 
solved ;  these  fall  into  two  distinct  systems  of  stories,  main  and 
subordinate,  and  each  system  shows  a  clash  and  disentanglement 
of  the  stones  of  which  it  is  made  up ;  finally  there  is  a  clash 
between  these  clashing  systems  of  stories,  before  the  final  dis- 
entanglement is  reached. 

More  briefly,  in  The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor^  maybe  sketched 
another  illustration  of  such  complication  of  complication.  Here 
we  have  a  primary  and  a  secondary  plot.  The  primary  plot  is  a 
clash  of  triple  intrigues.  One  is  Falstaff's  intrigue  against  the 
merry  wives :  this  must  be  taken  as  a  single  action,  because  Sir 
John's  impudence  goes  so  far  as  to  use  the  same  letter  for  both, 
with  nothing  but  the  names  diff"erent.  This  intrigue  is  crossed  by 
two  others :  one  is  the  retribution  of  the  wives,  for  Mistress  Page 
and  Mistress  Ford  have  compared  their  letters,  and  join  in  a  com- 
mon revenge ;  the  other  is  the  deep  scheme  of  the  jealous  Ford 
to  faciHtate  Falstaff''s  pursuit  until  the  guilty  parties  can  be  de- 
tected.   The  whole  primary  plot  is  thus  a  clash  of  intrigues  in 

1  IV.  ii,  from  25;  V.  i,  from  175. 

2  Compare  below,  page  343. 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN   EQUILIBRIUM  1 75 

corrupt  wooing.  For  the  secondary  plot  we  have  natural  wooing  : 
not  only  is  it  innocent,  but  it  is  the  love  of  youth  and  maid.  There 
are  three  suits  for  the  hand  of  Anne  Page  :  Slender's  suit  is  backed 
by  Anne's  father,  with  a  view  to  the  union  of  estates ;  Dr.  Caius's 
suit  is  backed  by  Anne's  mother,  money  being  the  motive ;  Fen- 
ton's  suit  is  backed  by  Anne  herself,  for  it  is  a  case  of  true  love. 
As  three  rivals  are  seeking  the  same  girl  the  secondary  plot  (like 
the  primary)  is  necessarily  a  clashing  of  three  intrigues.  All  these 
separate  interests  are  being  carried  on  together,  until  in  the  end 
the  one  system  is  brought  into  conflict  with  the  other.  The  wives 
of  the  primary  plot,  now  in  full  reconcilement  with  their  husbands, 
launch  one  more  device  against  Falstaff :  he  is  to  be  enticed  to 
Windsor  Park  at  night,  and  set  upon  by  young  people  in  guise  of 
fairies.  But  in  the  details  of  this  device  the  plotters  part  company  : 
Anne's  father  will  utilise  the  masquerade  in  order  to  have  Anne 
carried  off  by  the  suitor  he  favours ;  unknown  to  the  father,  her 
mother  arranges  a  similar  scheme  in  favour  of  her  candidate ; 
Fenton  has  a  plan  of  his  own.^  In  the  sequel  the  primary  and 
secondary  plots  are  seen  to  meet  in  this  common  climax  of  the 
masquerade  ;  by  the  personages  of  the  secondary  plot  the  hero  of 
the  main  plot  has  been  put  to  final  discomfiture,  the  vast  bulk  of  him 
pinched  and  burnt  by  the  young  fairies  with  their  tapers.  But  this 
triumph  of  the  primary  plot  has  reacted  on  the  secondary  plot, 
and  disentangled  the  intrigues  for  Anne  by  giving  her  to  her  own 
lover.  The  mutual  disentanglement  is  emphatic,  as  the  discomfited 
Falstaff  has  his  laugh  against  the  irate  father  and  mother  :  ^  all  agree 
to  be  reconciled  and  make  a  night  of  it. 

Here  then  is  the  first  of  the  two  elements  which  make  up  the 
Shakespearean  conception  of  comedy.  All  through  previous  dra- 
matic development  the  word  '  comedy'  has  been  drawing  nearer  and 
nearer  to  the  word  *  story ' :  Shakespeare's  comedies  are  harmo- 
nies of  stories.  The  harmony  is  again  found  to  be  intensification 
of  story  interest.     The  simple  sequence  of  events  that  is  sufficient 

1  Merry  Wives  IV.  iv,  vi.  2  v.  v.  fin. 


1/6  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

to  make  a  story  is  intensified  when  the  events  move  through  the 
stages  of  compUcation  and  resolution ;  in  Shakespeare  a  number  of 
these  comphcated  stories  will  be  complicated  into  a  mutual  clash 
and  disentanglement;  systems  of  such  clashing  stories  are  still 
further  carried  to  fresh  clash  and  disentanglement.  As  a  mathe- 
matical quantity  is  raised  to  a  higher  power  by  being  multiplied 
into  itself,  and  multipUed  again  and  yet  again,  so  by  successive  com- 
plications of  complications  Shakespearean  comedy  intensifies  interest 
of  story  to  the  highest  point  which  artistic  receptiveness  can  endure. 
The  second  main  element  of  Shakespearean  comedy  is  due  to 
the  survival  of  what  has  entered  into  comedy  in  the  various  phases 
of  it  that  preceded  Shakespeare.  A  drama  is  a  spectacle,  and  a 
spectacle  implies  a  spectator :  all  that  is  presented  is  arranged 
with  a  view  to  the  appeal  it  will  make  to  the  spectator's  emotional 
nature.  In  various  periods  comedy  has  made  its  appeal  to  the 
emotions  in  various  ways.  Even  in  primitive  comedy  the  sympa- 
thies were  drawn  out  in  different  directions  :  they  must  come  into 
touch  with  fun  and  abandon,  with  biting  satire,  with  broad  farce 
and  caricature.  When  Attic  Comedy  added  its  choral  lyrics, 
appeal  was  made  to  opposite  sympathies  at  the  same  time,  to  the 
ludicrous  and  to  the  serious.  Now,  a  convenient  word  to  express 
these  diverse  appeals  to  the  spectator's  emotional  sympathies  is  the 
word  tones.  Instinctively  the  mind  forms  a  scale  of  these  tones, 
like  a  musical  scale  :  interest  of  story  may  be  taken  as  the  indiffer- 
ence point  —  since  this  is  an  intellectual  and  not  an  emotional 
interest  —  and  on  either  side  of  this  middle  point  we  have  tones 
rising  to  the  tragic,  sinking  to  wild  abandon. 

Tragic 

Serious 

Fancy 

Interest  of  Story  (emotionally  indifferent) 

Wit 

Ludicrous 

Satire  and  Caricature 

Fun  and  Abandon 


COMEDY  AS  LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  1 77 

Different  analysts  would  construct  their  scale  differently ;  perhaps 
no  two  would  agree  entirely  in  their  definitions  of  such  words  as 
*  fancy  *  and  *  ludicrous.'  But  this  makes  no  difficulty :  precise 
analysis  is  out  of  place  where  the  question  is  of  so  fluent  a  thing 
as  the  emotional  effect  of  a  spectacle  on  a  spectator.  It  is  enough 
to  lay  down  the  general  conception  of  a  scale  of  tones,  with  higher 
and  lower  as  more  serious  and  less  serious.  In  this  sense  comedy 
through  large  part  of  its  history  has  exhibited  a  mixture  of  tones. 
But  Shakespeare  goes  beyond  mixture  :  we  may  lay  it  down  as  the 
second  element  in  the  Shakespearean  conception  that  Comedy  is  a 
harmony  of  tones.  It  is  not  enough  to  say  that  there  is  no  obstacle 
to  the  mingling  of  serious  and  light  matter  :  the  impression  given 
is  that  *a  blending  of  tones  into  a  harmony  is  a  fundamental  part 
of  the  whole  design. 

Sometimes  this  harmony  takes  the  form  of  balance :  for  the 
higher  tone  found  in  one  part  of  the  play  an  equipoise  is  sought 
in  the  lower  tone  of  another  part.  The  Taming  of  the  ShreWj 
with  its  elaborate  crossing  of  love  intrigues,  leads  us  only  a  little 
way  towards  the  serious  side  of  life  and  character :  accordingly 
this  serious  is  sufficiently  balanced  in  the  underplot  by  the  simple 
farce  of  the  pert  Grumio,  in  whom  we  have  a  reappearance  of  the 
Roman  type  of  the  saucy  slave,  joking  his  threadbare  jokes  and 
getting  his  conventional  beating  from  his  master.  Similar  intrigues 
in  the  The  Merry  Wives  involve  however  a  much  deeper  element 
of  the  serious  in  the  brooding  jealousies  of  Ford.  To  balance  this 
we  have,  not  one,  but  a  whole  chorus  of  caricatures  :  Shallow,  the 
rustic  magnate ;  Slender,  the  raw  material  of  loutish  shyness  out 
of  which  such  rustic  importance  is  eventually  made ;  Welsh  par- 
son Evans,  with  his  chop-logic  pedantry,  and  the  fire-eating 
French  doctor  his  antagonist ;  Pistol,  all  stage  rant,  his  comrade 
Nym,  all  emphatic  under-statement,  with  a  third  comrade,  Bar- 
dolph,  whose  face  is  humour  enough;  mine  host  of  the  Garter 
Inn,  with  his  gush  of  good  fellowship,  and  his  role  of  everybody's 
manager ;  Mistress  Quickly,  the  go-between,  brazen-faced  in  sim- 
plicity, with  voluble  inventiveness  humouring  everybody  all  round 


1/8  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

for  tips.  It  is  another  illustration  of  the  same  type,  where  we  find 
the  intricate  tangle  of  love  stories  in  A  Midsiimmer-Nighfs  Dream 
supported,  on  the  one  side  by  the  exquisite  fancies  of  fairy  life,  on 
the  other  side  by  the  broadest  farce  of  the  clowns  and  their  uncon- 
scious burlesque  of  Pyramus  and  Thisbe. 

In  other  cases  the  eifect  is  not  so  much  the  balancing  of  oppo- 
sites,  as  the  blending  of  several  tones  in  a  rich  and  full  harmony. 
A  perfect  illustration  is  Much  Ado  about  Nothing :  here  we  have 
for  complication  a  villanous  intrigue  that  takes  us  to  the  very 
borders  of  the  tragic ;  its  resolution  is  in  the  farcical  fussiness  of 
Dogberry  and  Verges ;  while  the  intervals  of  the  play  —  like  the 
mean  parts  in  a  musical  harmony  —  are  filled  up  with  a  rich 
blend  of  wit  and  ludicrous  situation,  Benedick  and  Beatrice'  drawn 
railing  into  one  another's  arms.^  In  the  preceding  chapter  we  have 
seen  how  Measure  for  Measure  works  out  a  tragic  situation  in  high 
life,  throws  over  low  life  the  clown-like  humour  of  Pompey,  and 
hnks  the  two  together  by  the  more  poHshed  humour  of  Lucio  and 
the  ludicrous  irony  of  the  situations  into  which  his  free  tongue 
brings  him.  In  The  Comedy  of  Errors  we  see  blended  in  har- 
mony a  serious  element,  the  peril  and  release  of  ^geon ;  the 
comedy  of  errors  itself,  with  its  ludicrous  situations ;  and  an  un- 
derplot of  mere  farce,  the  Roman  type  of  the  impudent  slave 
appearing  once  more.  On  precisely  similar  lines  runs  the  play 
oi  AlVs  Well:  the  character  of  Bertram  in  its  echpse  and  recov- 
ery is  the  serious  action ;  the  folly  of  Parolles  and  its  exposure 
make  the  ludicrous  tone ;  while  in  place  of  the  Roman  slave  we 
have  the  clown  his  modern  counterpart.  Only  a  httle  different  is 
Twelfth  Nighty  where  the  highest  tone  is  love  fancy ;  the  under- 
plot is  ludicrous  exposure  of  folly;  and  the  clown  again  makes 
a  third  tone,  ingeniously  brought  into  touch  with  every  person- 
age of  the  play.  The  Merchant  of  Venice  travels  far  towards  the 
tragic  :  this  serious  tone  is  supported  by  the  ripple  of  wit  running 
through  the  parts  of  Portia,  Nerissa,  Lorenzo,  Gratiano,  Launce- 

1  Compare  the  schemes  of  these  plays  in  the  Appendix. 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  1 79 

lot ;  to  make  a  fuller  chord  is  added  the  single  farcical  touch  of 
Launcelot's  meeting  with  old  Gobbo.  Perhaps  the  fullest  har- 
mony of  tones  is  to  be  found  in  The  Te7npest,  We  rise  to  the 
most  exalted  point  of  the  serious  when  Prospero,  temporarily 
omnipotent,  wields  dispensations  of  providence  over  "  the  three 
men  of  sin  " ;  with  this  we  blend  the  simple  love  interest  of  Fer- 
dinand and  Miranda ;  there  is  the  sustained  wit  of  Gonzalo  and 
the  courtiers  who  tease  him ;  lowest  of  all  we  have  the  farcical 
business  of  the  intoxicated  sailors  led  in  dread  conspiracy  by  the 
fish-monster  Caliban. 

In  some  cases  the  emotional  impression  of  a  story  cannot  be 
conveyed  by  such  simple  terms  as  those  that  have  made  up  our 
scale  of  tones ;  it  is  something  complex  and  many-sided,  and  we 
sometimes  seek  to  express  it  by  speaking  of  the  '  atmosphere  '  of 
the  story.  In  such  cases  the  harmony  of  tones  will  become  — 
though  the  expression  strains  metaphor  —  a  harmony  of  atmos- 
pheres. In  a  former  chapter  we  have  noted  how,  in  Winter's 
Takj  as  we  pass  from  complication  to  resolution  we  meet  a  total 
change  of  spirit,  from  court  life  with  high  responsibility  and  grave 
sin  to  rustic  simplicity  and  harmless  roguery;  in  CytJibeiine  we 
noted  a  similar  change  from  the  atmosphere  of  the  court  to  the 
open  air  life  and  the  spirit  of  the  cave  and  the  mountain.  Great 
part  of  As  You  Like  It  is  confined  within  the  Forest  of  Arden,  and 
is  the  old  conventional  pastoral  life,  with  such  conventional  loves 
as  those  of  Silvius  and  Phoebe  :  a  different  atmosphere  is  brought 
to  bear  upon  this  as  it  is  played  upon  by  a  triple  humour  —  the 
natural  humour  of  Rosalind,  the  professional  humour  of  Touch- 
stone, and  the  morbid  humour  of  Jaques,  whose  carefully  culti- 
vated melancholy  depreciates  everything  with  a  lurid  brightness. 
In  Love's  Labour's  Lost  we  have  an  atmosphere  of  the  artificial : 
the  artificial  bond  of  the  mutual  vow,  the  artificial  life  of  celibacy, 
the  euphuism  of  Armado,  and  the  equally  artificial  pedantry  of 
Nathaniel  and  Holofernes.  This  appears  as  the  local  atmosphere 
of  Navarre  ;  the  advent  of  the  French  princess  and  her  suite,  like 
a  change  of  weather,  brings  in  a  new  atmosphere  of  pure  gay  hu- 


l80  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

mour,  and  the  impact  of  the  one  upon  the  other  gives  sustained 
coruscations  of  wit  and  fun.^ 

In  this  connection  the  comedy  of  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona 
needs  fuller  consideration.  The  reader  of  this  play,  upon  the 
first  perusal  of  it,  may  well  be  staggered  at  some  of  its  departures 
from  what  is  natural  and  probable;  especially  the  climax  up  to 
which  the  whole  movement  leads,  when  the  false  Proteus  makes 
love  to  the  unwilling  Silvia  in  the  hearing  of  Valentine.^  Valen- 
tine discovers  himself,  and  taunts  his  friend  with  his  perfidy; 
Proteus  can  only  throw  himself  upon  his  friend's  mercy;  whereupon 
Valentine  answers : 

Who  by  repentance  is  not  satisfied 
Is  nor  of  heaven  nor  earth,  for  these  are  pleased. 
By  penitence  the  Eternal's  wrath's  appeased : 
And,  that  my  love  may  appear  plain  and  free, 
All  that  was  mine  in  Silvia  I  give  thee. 

The  forgiveness  is  all  well  and  good  :  but  what  are  we  to  say  of  the 
last  line,  in  which  the  faithfiil  Valentine  bestows  the  equally  faith- 
ful Silvia  on  the  faithless  friend?  But  further  study  of  this  drama 
illustrates  a  certain  paradox  of  interpretation  —  that  difficulties  by 
multiplying  may  diminish.  We  find  every  portion  of  this  play 
crowded  with  unrealities  and  improbabilities  and  artificialities, 
until  we  recognise  at  last  that  we  are  not  in  the  ordinary  world  at 
all.  Over  the  story  has  been  thrown  the  atmosphere  of  the  '  gay 
science '  —  the  poetry  of  the  troubadours  and  the  courts  of  love  : 
the  conventional  love  Hterature  from  which  love  was  the  one  thing 
absent ;  which  ransacked  ingenuity  for  conceits  and  riddles  and 
twists  and  turns  of  mental  fencing  and  word  play,  cast  these  into 
songs,  or  sonnets  and  *  passions,'  and  selected  the  nearest  princess, 
or  neighbour's  wife,  or  little  child,  as  an  animated  target  against 
which  to  practise  love-making,  no  more  to  be  confused  with  a  real 
object  of  passion  than  the  dedicatee  of  an  eighteenth-century  book 

1  This  feature  of  the  two  plays  {Love's  Labour's  Lost  and  As  You  Like  It)  is 
treated  at  full  length  in  my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist :  Chapters  XIV,  XV. 

2  Two  Gentlemen:  V.  iv,  especially  from  54. 


COMEDY  AS   LIFE  IN  EQUILIBRIUM  l8l 

is  to  be  understood  as  its  hero.  Thus,  in  Two  Gentlemen^  no 
sooner  have  a  few  lines  of  natural  writing  brought  out  some  neces- 
sary point  in  the  action  than  the  conversation  will  drift  into  a  bout 
of  wit- fencing,  the  chief  goodness  of  the  jests  consisting  in  their 
badness.^ 

Proteus.      For  I  will  be  thy  beadsman,  Valentine. 
Valentine.  And  on  a  love-book  pray  for  my  success  ? 
Proteus.      Upon  some  book  I  love  I'll  pray  for  thee. 
Valentine.  That's  on  some  shallow  story  of  deep  love : 

How  young  Leander  cross'd  the  Hellespont. 
Proteus.      That's  a  deep  story  of  a  deeper  love ; 

For  he  was  more  than  over  shoes  in  love. 
Valentine.  'Tis  true ;  for  you  are  over  boots  in  love. 

And  yet  you  never  swum  the  Hellespont. 
Proteus.      Over  the  boots?  nay,  give  me  not  the  boots. 
Valentine.  No,  I  will  not,  for  it  boots  thee  not. 
Proteus.  What? 

Valentine.  To  be  in  love,  where  scorn  is  bought  with  groans ; 

Coy  looks  with  heart-sore  sighs  ;  one  fading  moment's  mirth 

With  twenty  watchful,  weary,  tedious  nights  : 

If  haply  won,  perhaps  a  hapless  gain ; 

If  lost,  why  then  a  grievous  labour  won  ; 

However,  but  a  folly  bought  with  wit. 

Or  else  a  wit  by  folly  vanquished. 
Proteus.      So,  by  your  circumstance,  you  call  me  fool. 
Valentine.  So,  by  your  circumstance,  I  fear  you'll  prove. 

Similarly,  when  a  sentiment  or  a  situation  is  to  be  expressed,  the 
language  regularly  passes  into  the  form  of  a  sonnet,  —  not  indeed 
the  strict  sonnet  of  fourteen  lines,  but  such  sonnet-like  play  of 
thought  as  would  fit  the  passage  for  a  place  in  the  Hekatompathia.^ 

To  leave  my  Julia,  shall  I  be  forsworn ; 
To  love  fair  Silvia,  shall  I  be  forsworn  ; 
To  wrong  my  friend,  I  shall  be  much  forsworn ; 

U.i. 

2  II.  vi.  1-30.    For  other  examples  compare  I,  ii.  105-29;  IL  iv.  129-42;  Il.vii. 
24-38 ;  III.  i.  140-51  and  171-87  ;  III.  ii.  73-87  (note  line  69). 


1 82  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

And  even  that  power  which  gave  me  first  my  oath 

Provokes  me  to  this  three-fold  perjury ; 

Love  bade  me  swear  and  Love  bids  me  forswear. 

0  sweet-suggesting  Love,  if  thou  hast  sinn'd, 
Teach  me,  thy  tempted  subject,  to  excuse  it ! 
At  first  I  did  adore  a  twinkling  star, 

But  now  I  worship  a  celestial  sun. 
Unheedful  vows  may  heedfully  be  broken ; 
And  he  wants  wit  that  wants  resolved  will 
To  learn  his  wit  to  exchange  the  bad  for  better. 
Fie,  fie,  unreverend  tongue!  to  call  her  bad, 
Whose  sovereignty  so  oft  thou  hast  preferred 
With  twenty  thousand  soul-confirming  oaths. 

1  cannot  leave  to  love,  and  yet  I  do ; 

But  there  I  leave  to  love  where  I  should  love. 

Julia  I  lose  and  Valentine  I  lose : 

If  I  keep  them,  I  needs  must  lose  myself; 

If  I  lose  them,  thus  find  I  by  their  loss 

For  Valentine  myself,  for  Julia  Silvia, 

I  to  myself  am  dearer  than  a  friend. 

For  love  is  still  most  precious  in  itself; 

And  Silvia  —  witness  Heaven,  that  made  her  fair  !  — 

Shows  Julia  but  a  swarthy  Ethiope. 

I  will  forget  that  Julia  is  alive. 

Remembering  that  my  love  to  her  is  dead ; 

And  Valentine  Pll  hold  an  enemy. 

Aiming  at  Silvia  as  a  sweeter  friend. 

When  we  have  our  minds  thoroughly  saturated  with  this  atmos- 
phere of  the  gay  science,  we  shall  feel  no  difficulty  even  in  the 
climax  of  the  play.  To  weigh  in  the  scales  of  sentiment  the  mis- 
tress and  the  friend  is  precisely  the  sort  of  knotty  question  which 
the  courts  of  love  would  poetically  take  up ;  and  a  pleasant  judi- 
cature —  which  considered  it  a  contradiction  in  terms  for  a  man  to 
be  in  love  with  his  own  wife  —  would  be  as  likely  as  not,  in  the 
present  issue,  to  sacrifice  love  on  the  altar  of  friendship. 

It  remains  to  point  out  that  in  this  play,  as  in  those  previously 
noted,  we  have  a  balance  of  atmospheres.     The  two  gentlemen 


COMEDY  AS  LIFE  IN   EQUILIBRIUM  1 83 

have  their  two  servants :  the  comparatively  heavy  atmosphere  of 
euphuistic  conceit  is  contrasted  with  the  Hght  farcical  humour 
of  the  stable  and  servant's  hall.  Speed  and  Launce  have  their 
bouts  of  wit.  Where  Speed  banters  his  love-lorn  master  we  seem 
to  realise  that  there  might  be  such  a  thing  as  a  prose  sonnet. 

Valentine,  Why,  how  know  you  that  I  am  in  love  ? 

Speed.  Marry,  by  these  special  marks  :  first,  you  have  learned, 
like  Sir  Proteus,  to  wreathe  your  arms,  like  a  malecontent ;  to 
relish  a  love-song,  like  a  robin-redbreast ;  to  walk  alone,  like 
one  that  had  the  pestilence ;  to  sigh,  like  a  school-boy  that  had 
lost  his  A  B  C ;  to  weep,  like  a  young  wench  that  had  buried 
her  grandam;  to  fast,  like  one  that  takes  diet;  to  watch, 
like  one  that  fears  robbing ;  to  speak  puling,  like  a  beggar  at 
Hallowmas.  You  were  wont,  when  you  laughed,  to  crow  like 
a  cock ;  when  you  walked,  to  walk  like  one  of  the  lions  ;  when 
you  fasted,  it  was  presently  after  dinner ;  when  you  looked 
sadly,  it  was  for  want  of  money :  and  now  you  are  metamor- 
phosed with  a  mistress,  that,  when  I  look  on  you,  I  can  hardly 
think  you  my  master.^ 

More  than  this,  the  devotion  which  the  gentlemen  pour  out  upon 
their  supreme  mistresses  Launce  reserves  for  his  dog.  He  takes  his 
pet's  unsavoury  offence  upon  himself,  and  is  whipped  in  his  stead ;  ^ 
yet,  like  his  master,  he  has  to  mourn  hard-heartedness  in  the  object 
of  his  affections. 

I  think  Crab  my  dog  be  the  sourest-natured  dog  that 
lives  :  my  mother  weeping,  my  father  wailing,  my  sister  crying, 
our  maid  howling,  our  cat  wringing  her  hands,  and  all  our  house 
in  a  great  perplexity,  yet  did  not  this  cruel-hearted  cur  shed 
one  tear :  he  is  a  stone,  a  very  pebble-stone,  and  has  no  more 
pity  in  him  than  a  dog :  a  Jew  would  have  wept  to  have  seen 
our  parting ;  why,  my  grandam,  having  no  eyes,  look  you,  wept 
herself  blind  at  my  parting.  Nay,  Til  show  you  the  manner 
of  it.  This  shoe  is  my  father :  no,  this  left  shoe  is  my  father : 
no,  no,  this  left  shoe  is  my  mother :  nay,  that  cannot  be  so 
neither :  yes,  it  is  so,  it  is  so,  it  hath  the  worser  sole    .    .    . 

1  II.  i,  from  17.  2  IV.  iv. 


1 84  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Now,  sir,  this  staff  is  my  sister,  for,  look  you,  she  is  as  white 
as  a  Hly,  and  as  small  as  a  wand :  this  hat  is  Nan,  our  maid : 
I  am  the  dog :  no,  the  dog  is  himself,  and  I  am  the  dog  — 
Oh!  the  dog  is  me,  and  I  am  myself;  ay,  so,  so.  Now  come  I 
to  my  father;  Father,  your  blessing:  now  should  not  the 
shoe  speak  a  word  for  weeping:  now  should  I  kiss  my 
father ;  well,  he  weeps  on.  Now  come  I  to  my  mother :  O, 
that  she  could  speak  now  like  a  wood  woman !  Well,  I  kiss 
her,  why,  there  'tis ;  here's  my  mother's  breath  up  and  down. 
Now  come  I  to  my  sister ;  mark  the  moan  she  makes.  Now 
the  dog  all  this  while  sheds  not  a  tear,  nor  speaks  a  word ;  but 
see  how  I  lay  the  dust  with  my  tears.^ 

The  balancing  of  atmosphere  with  atmosphere  can  hardly  go 
further  than  when  tours-de-force  of  doggie  sentiment  are  used  to 
counterpoise  high-flown  sentimentalism  of  the  gay  science. 

Under  these  two  heads  then  may  be  formulated  the  Shake- 
spearean conception  of  comedy  :  story  raised  to  its  highest  power 
of  complexity,  and  the  harmony  of  tones.  Comedy  so  constituted 
stands  in  a  clear  relation  to  the  moral  order  of  the  universe.  It 
presents  life  in  equilibrium  :  every  intricacy  of  complication  fitted 
with  its  due  resolution,  as  when  musical  discords  melt  into  con- 
cords ;  the  higher  tones  of  our  nature  supported  by  or  blended 
with  the  lower  tones  in  full  emotional  harmony.  And  the  cor- 
relative conception  is  at  once  suggested,  that  in  tragedy  we  have 
equilibrium  overthrown.  This  last  is  the  subject  of  the  chapter 
that  follows. 

1 11.  iii. 


IX 

TRAGEDY  AS   EQUILIBRIUM   OVERTHROWN 

The  received  classification  of  Shakespeare's  plays  is  positive  as 
regards  comedies.  Between  tragedies  and  histories  the  line  is 
difficult  to  draw,  and  the  terms  are  not  mutually  exclusive.  The 
relation  of  the  histories  to  the  moral  system  of  Shakespeare 
will  appear  in  connection  with  another  part  of  this  work :  ^  the 
immediate  question  is  as  to  the  Shakespearean  conception  of 
tragedy.  It  has  been  in  the  main  anticipated  by  the  discussion 
of  the  preceding  chapter. 

Shakespeare,  we  have  seen,  represents  romantic  drama:  the 
union  of  drama  and  romance.  The  latter  term  must  be  stretched 
to  include  the  chronicle  histories,  and  such  a  work  as  Plutarch ; 
these  are  treated  in  the  same  spirit  as  the  ordinary  story  books  of 
romance,  for  of  history  in  the  modern  scientific  sense  there  was  no 
thought.  By  the  other  component  element,  drama,  is  meant  the 
revived  dramatic  Hterature  of  Greece  and  Rome.  There  was  of 
course  a  Mediaeval  Drama  —  of  miracle  plays,  mysteries,  moralities, 
interludes,  histories  — which  extended  into  the  Shakespearean  age ; 
and  there  is  evidence  that  some  of  its  histories  were  utilised  as 
materials  for  the  preparation  of  Shakespearean  dramas.  But  this 
does  not  alter  the  fact  that,  considered  as  a  species  in  Hterature, 
the  Shakespearean  drama  made  a  fresh  start,  under  the  inspiration 
of  the  revived  classical  dramas  and  the  accumulated  stores  of 
romance.  I  do  not  mean  to  suggest  that  the  Mediaeval  Drama  was 
entirely  without  influence  on  the  coming  drama  of  the  Renaissance  : 
but  the  influence  was  of  an  indirect  kind.  It  may  be  said  indeed 
that  the  Mediaeval  is  an  anticipation  of  the  Romantic  Drama.     Part 

1  Chapter  XIII. 
185 


1 86  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

of  the  wealth  of  story  accumulated  in  the  age  of  romance  consisted 
in  sacred  story  —  the  narrative  of  the  Bible  and  the  lives  of  the 
saints ;  to  act  these  sacred  stories  for  a  populace  that  could  not 
read  them  was  the  original  purpose  of  the  miracle  plays,  however 
much  they  may  have  widened  their  design  subsequently.  Thus 
the  essence  of  the  Mediaeval,  as  of  the  Romantic  Drama,  was  the 
application  of  dramatic  form  to  story  material,  the  story  being  of 
at  least  equal  importance  with  the  dramatic  effects.  The  influence 
of  audiences  trained  for  generations  in  dramatised  story  by  the 
miracle  plays,  and  similar  shows,  was  a  powerful  bulwark  to  the 
poets  of  the  Romantic  Drama,  in  their  struggle  against  a  criticism 
that  would  have  subjected  the  stage  again  to  the  limitations  of 
pre-romance  drama.  Without  ignoring  then  this  influence  of  the 
Mediaeval  Drama  we  may  nevertheless  say  that  the  Romantic  Drama 
of  Shakespeare  has  its  roots  in  ancient  drama  and  in  romance ; 
in  these  two  directions  we  are  to  look  if  we  are  inquiring  what 
may  be  expected  to  enter  into  the  Shakespearean  conception  of 
tragedy. 

In  Greek  literature  tragedy  and  comedy  were  distinct,  and 
tragedy  was  '  serious  '  drama.  The  popular  idea  that  a  tragedy  is 
a  play  which  ends  unhappily,  as  opposed  to  comedies  with  their 
happy  endings,  will  not  bear  confronting  with  the  masterpieces 
of  antiquity,  ^schylus's  Trilogy  of  Orestes  ends  with  Orestes 
delivered  and  the  magnificent  festival  of  the  Eumenides;  the 
(Edipus  at  Colonus  of  Sophocles,  after  heart-rending  spectacles 
of  suffering,  displays  the  exaltation  of  its  hero;  no  play  could 
have  a  happier  ending  than  the  Alcestis  of  Euripides  :  yet  all  these 
are  tragedies.  It  was  not  the  nature  of  the  movement,  but  the 
serious  tone  that  made  a  tragedy  to  the  Greeks.  It  could  hardly 
be  other  than  serious,  for  Greek  tragedy  was  a  religious  service, 
commencing  with  ritual  at  the  altar  of  Dionysus  ;  the  choral  odes 
led  the  thoughts  of  the  audience  in  religious  meditation,  like  the 
anthems  and  hymns  of  a  modern  choir ;  the  acted  scenes  were 
sacred  myths,  like  the  acted  sermon  of  the  miracle  play.  The 
criticism  of  the  age  laid  its  emphasis  on  this  serious  character  of 


TRAGEDY  AS   EQUILIBRIUM   OVERTHROWN  1 87 

tragedy,  in  Aristotle's  definition  of  it  as  imitation  of  a  "  worthy, 
illustrious,  perfect "  action ;  he  makes  its  moral  purpose  that  of 
purifying  the  emotions  of  pity  and  terror.  Close  analysis  may 
detect,  especially  in  plays  of  Euripides,  some  appearance  of  lighter 
matter  as  relief;  but  to  the  end  of  the  ancient  literature  the  con- 
ception of  tragedy  was  sufficiently  defined  by  its  sombre  tone. 

It  was  under  the  influence  of  romance  that  the  original  concep- 
tion came  to  be  modified.  We  have  seen  in  the  preceding  chap- 
ter how  the  words  tragedy  and  comedy  were  used  of  the  narrated 
stories  of  the  dark  ages ;  how  in  the  freedom  of  minstrel  narration 
some  rapprochement  took  place  between  the  two  terms,  tragedy 
admitting  more  of  the  comic  and  comedy  more  of  the  tragic. 
What  is  more  important  than  this,  we  have  seen  how,  towards  the 
close  of  the  dark  ages,  a  turn  of  fashion  in  popular  taste  produced 
a  literary  impulse  of  long  continuance,  destined  to  influence  more 
than  anything  else  the  conception  of  tragedy  in  the  future.  A 
single  type  of  serious  story  predominated  over  all  others.  From 
the  time  of  Henry  of  Huntingdon  in  the  twelfth  century,  and  his 
Contempt  of  the  Worlds  there  appeared  collections  of  tragedies 
the  interest  of  which  lay  in  presenting  the  illustrious  of  mankind 
falling  into  ruin  or  obscurity ;  such  writers  as  Boccaccio,  with  his 
De  Casibus  Illustrium  Viroruniy  and  Lydgate,  with  his  Falls  of 
Princes,  made  their  contributions  to  this  popular  form  of  litera- 
ture. The  hold  which  this  type  of  tragedy  had  on  the  public 
mind  even  in  the  Elizabethan  age  is  evidenced  by  the  number 
of  successive  works  which  bear  the  common  title  of  A  Mirror  for 
Magistrates ;  to  one  of  the  series  splendid  contributions  were 
made  by  the  Sackville  who,  in  Gorboduc,  is  recognised  as  one 
of  the  fathers  of  our  modern  drama.  Thus  tragedy  came  into  the  K 
age  of  Shakespeare  with  this  special  connotation  of  fallen  great- 
ness ;  it  is  serious  story  with  a  tendency  to  a  single  type  of  seri- 
ousness. As  comedy  has  enlarged  to  the  general  presentation 
of  Hfe  in  equilibrium,  so  tragedy  has  specialised  to  the  concep- 
tion of  equilibrium  overthrown.  A  tragedy  is,  to  Shakespeare's 
audience  and  to  Shakespeare,  a  story  of  a  fall. 


1 88  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Sometimes  in  Shakespearean  tragedy  we  have  the  career  and 
the  fall  of  an  evildoer ;  scarcely  any  other  motive  will  be  found 
to  underHe  the  play  of  Richard  the  Second,  Elsewhere  the  plot 
is  made  by  the  fall  of  many  :  as  we  observe  the  career  of  Richard 
the  Third,  we  see  his  Hfe  an  agency  of  doom  to  all  around  him, 

I  in  his  death  he  himself  becomes  a  victim.  In  such  a  play  as 
Romeo  and  Juliet  the  tragedy  lies  in  the  fall  of  the  innocent. 
Yet  another  variety  appears  in  Lear  or  Othello :  the  hero  is  here 
great  and  noble,  the  tragic  interest  lies  in  watching  how,  in  the 
mysteries  of  providence,  the  small  sin  or  omission  overbalances 
the  general  nobihty,  and  there  is  the  same  end  of  ruin.  In  other 
cases  the  idea  of  the  outer  and  the  inner  life  comes  in :  for  the 
various  personages  of  Henry  the  Eighth  the  fall  in  the  world  with- 
out is  a  rise  in  the  life  within;  even  in  Antony  and  Cleopatra 
something  of  a  higher  life  is  seen  to  spring  up  amid  the  ruin  of  a 
righteous  doom.  But  in  all  cases  alike,  what  we  see  of  fall  is 
a  fall  from  which  there  is  no  recovery ;  tragedy  is  a  complication 
never  to  be  resolved. 

In  the  case  of  comedy  the  equilibrium  appeared,  not  only  in 
the  movement  of  the  story,  which  balanced  complication  with 
resolution,  but  also  in  the  balance  and  harmony  of  light  and 
serious  tones.  The  converse  applies  to  Shakespearean  tragedy : 
in  tone,  as  well  as  in  movement,  equilibrium  is  overthrown.  The 
mixture  of  tones  in  tragedy  is  no  balance :  the  serious  preponder- 
ates altogether  over  the  light,  is  intensified  the  more  because  of 
the  presence  of  this  hghter  matter.  It  is  a  fundamental  principle 
of  our  mental  economy,  that  the  stronger  emotions  are  soon  ex- 
hausted into  apathy ;  those  dramatists  will  draw  the  most  of  pity 
and  terror  out  of  us  who  know  how,  at  the  proper  points,  to  relieve 
this  pity  and  terror  with  opposite  tones  of  feeHng.  The  more 
Shakespeare's  dramas  are  examined,  the  more  evident  it  will  be 
that  the  principle  of  relief  is  the  law  underlying  the  mixture  of 
tones  in  tragedy. 

In  the  tragedy  of  Richard  the  Second  no  relief  appears  in  the 
form  of  humorous  matter ;  possibly  we  may  see  it  in  the  spectacu- 


TRAGEDY  AS  EQUILIBRIUM  OVERTHROWN  1 89 

lar  interest  of  the  trial  by  combat.  Such  interest  is  found  on  a 
much  larger  scale  in  the  successive  pageants  of  Henry  the  Eighth^ 
which  however  take  that  play  out  of  the  category  of  tragedy,  and 
make  it  a  complex  form  of  drama.^  The  fun  and  abandon  which 
made  the  earliest  spirit  of  comedy  have  their  nearest  modern 
counterpart  in  the  clown  :  the  all-licensed  jester,  for  whom  ordi- 
nary social  proprieties  are  suspended,  who  may,  and  must,  twist  fun 
for  us  out  of  everything  and  out  of  nothing.  The  Clown  is  actually 
introduced,  with  all  his  laboured  fooling,  into  Othello:  his  two 
brief  appearances^  make  two  breathing  spaces  for  us  in  the  op- 
pressive crescendo  of  passion.  What  essentially  is  the  same  effect 
appears  in  Macbeth :  the  jesting  of  the  professional  fool  is  put 
into  the  mouth  of  the  Porter;  and  his  light  badinage,  standing 
between  the  horror  of  murder  and  the  shock  of  discovery,  has 
the  effect  of  the  single  flash  of  lightning  that  blackens  the  night.^ 
In  Tittis  Andronicus  is  a  slighter  device  of  the  same  kind :  the 
only  relief  to  the  accumulating  horrors  is  the  rustic  stupidity  of 
a  messenger,  who  is  called  *  clown'  in  the  other  sense  of  the 
word.*  There  is  again  a  group  of  tragedies  in  which  the  spirit 
of  the  professional  clown  is  read  into  one  of  the  leading  person- 
ages of  the  story.  In  King  John  the  eariier  appearances  of  Faul- 
conbridge  strike  us  in  this  vein ;  nothing  can  be  more  clown-like 
than  his  reiteration  to  the  pompous  Duke  of  the  Hne  *  — 

And  hang  a  calf's-skin  on  those  recreant  limbs. 

But  as  the  tragedy  progresses  the  tone  of  relief  melts  out  of  the 
personality  of  Faulconbridge,  and  he  becomes  a  grave  and  strenu- 
ous statesman.  Timon  of  Athens  has  for  relief  element  the  mis- 
anthropic humour  of  Apemantus,  called  in  the  list  of  personages 
*  a  churlish  philosopher ' ;  Coriolanus  similarly  has  Menenius,  with 
his  spleenful  mockery  of  the  populace  and  its  leaders ;  in  Julius 
Ccesar  somewhat  of  the  same  tone  is  put  into  the  mouths  of  the 

1  See  above,  pages  89-92.  «  Macbeth  II.  iii. 

2  Othello  III.  i  and  iv.  4  Titus  IV.  iii,  iv. 
6  King  John  III.  i.  131,  133,  199,  220,  299. 


190  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

mob ;  in  Antony  and  Cleopatra  Enobarbus  is  the  '  plain '  speaker, 
until  his  cynicism  is  melted  away  by  the  tragic  situation :  all  these 
are  but  examples  of  the  relief  element  of  the  clown  drawn  within 
the  personalities  of  the  story.  It  may  be  added  that  in  Richard  the 
Third  the  relief  seems  to  be  the  grim  humour  of  the  hero  in  the 
midst  of  his  devilry,  until  he  loses  his  equanimity  in  the  toils  of 
Y  fate.  In  Romeo  and  Juliet  the  relieving  wit  is  distributed  through 
the  parts  of  Mercutio,  the  Nurse,  and  the  Musicians :  it  has  all 
^disappeared  before  the  final  climax. 

In  two  of  Shakespeare's  most  famous  tragedies  the  relief  ele- 
ment is  of  a  much  more  elaborate  kind.  If  analysis  be  applied 
to  the  fooling  of  the  Shakespearean  jester  a  leading  element  will  be 
found  to  be  the  incongruity  and  incoherence  of  its  matter,  in 
this  case  of  course  intentional  incoherence.  But  the  unconscious 
incoherence  of  a  disordered  brain  may  be  used  with  somewhat  of 
the  same  effect.  It  has  been  contended  indeed  that  there  is  a  real 
difference  of  sympathetic  temperament  between  an  Elizabethan 
and  a  modern  audience;  that  the  symptoms  of  madness  which 
are  so  pathetic  to  us  were  to  our  ancestors  simply  funny.  How- 
ever this  may  be,  it  is  clear  that  the  wildness  of  insanity  is  used 
in  Shakespeare's  plays  as  a  variation  and  relief  to  tragedy.  A  mas- 
terly example  of  this  usage  is  seen  in  King  Lear.  As  the  old  man's 
brain  begins  to  break  down  under  his  daughters'  unkindness,  he 
passes  first  into  the  stage  of  hysteria. 

O,  how  this  mother  swells  up  toward  my  heart ! 
Hysterica  passio,  down,  thou  climbing  sorrow, 
Thy  element's  below. ^ 

Later  his  words  and  actions  are  helpless  insanity. 

O,  matter  and  impertinency  mix'd  ! 
Reason  in  madness  !  ^ 

Side  by  side  with  this  insanity  we  have  the  feigned  idiotcy  of 
Edgar :  sometimes  meaningless  nonsense,  sometimes  approach- 
ing the  mocking  nonsense  of  the  typical  clown. 

1  Lear  II.  iv.  56.  2  jy.  vi.  178. 


TRAGEDY  AS   EQUILIBRIUM  OVERTHROWN  191 

Lear.    What  hast  thou  been  ? 

Edgar.  A  serving-man,  proud  in  heart  and  mind;  that 
curled  my  hair;  wore  gloves  in  my  cap;  served  the  lust  of 
my  mistress'  heart,  and  did  the  act  of  darkness  with  her ;  swore 
as  many  oaths  as  I  spake  words,  and  broke  them  in  the  sweet 
face  of  heaven :  one  that  slept  in  the  contriving  of  lust,  and 
waked  to  do  it:  wine  loved  I  deeply,  dice  dearly;  and  in 
woman  out-paramoured  the  Turk :  false  of  heart,  light  of  ear, 
bloody  of  hand ;  hog  in  sloth,  fox  in  stealth,  wolf  in  greedi- 
ness, dog  in  madness,  lion  in  prey.  Let  not  the  creaking  of 
shoes  nor  the  rustling  of  silks  betray  thy  poor  heart  to  woman  : 
keep  thy  foot  out  of  brothels,  thy  hand  out  of  plackets,  thy  pen 
from  lender's  books,  and  defy  the  foul  fiend. 

Still  through  the  hawthorn  blows  the  cold  wind. 

Says  suum,  mun,  ha,  no,  nonny. 

Dolphin,  my  boy,  my  boy,  sessa  !  let  him  trot  by.^ 

When  a  third  type  of  nonsense  —  the  regular  clown  or  jester  — 
is  added  we  get,  through  the  central  scenes  of  King  Lear,  a  trio 
of  madnesses  —  real,  assumed,  professional  —  mingling  their  inco- 
herent ravings  :  a  fourth  form  of  wildness,  the  raging  of  the  tem- 
pest outside,  plays  a  dreadful  accompaniment.  So  complex  is  the 
relief  element  in  this  tragedy. 

An  equally  elaborate  treatment  of  relief  is  found  in  Hamlet.  As 
a  first  element  we  have  the  assumed  madness  of  Hamlet  himself. 
Hamlet  is  never  mad  :  the  poet's  treatment  is  so  clear  on  this 
point  that  I  can  only  express  astonishment  that  any  different  view 
should  have  crept  into  criticism.  At  the  beginning  of  the  story, 
even  before  the  excitement  of  the  Ghost  Scene,  the  hero  appears 
^LS  a  man  of  bitter  irony,  veiling  a  tone  of  feeling  with  an  opposite 
tone  of  expression. 

Horatio.    My  lord,  I  came  to  see  your  father's  funeral. 
Hamlet.     I  pray  thee,  do  not  mock  me,  fellow-student ; 
I  think  it  was  to  see  my  mother's  wedding. 

1  III.  iv.  87. 


192  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Horatio.     Indeed,  my  lord,  it  followed  close  upon. 
Hamlet.     Thrift,  thrift,  Horatio  !  the  funeral  baked-meats 
Did  coldly  furnish  forth  the  marriage  tables.^ 

When  suddenly  has  come  the  shock  of  a  revelation  —  a  revelation 
of  horror  taking  the  dubious  form  of  a  communication  from  the 
supernatural  world — it  is  small  wonder  that  a  man  of  this  temper- 
ament should  be  driven  fbr  a  mon^ent  to  hysteric  irony. 

0  villain,  villain,  smiling,  damned  villain  ! 
My  tables,  —  meet  it  is  I  set  it  down. 

That  one  may  smile,  and  smile,  and  be  a  villain. ^ 

In  this  mood  Hamlet  is  rejoined  by  his  comrades  ^ :  when  he  sees 
the  astonishment  on  their  faces  at  his  own  wild  irony,  his  quick 
mind  catches  the  thought  of  using  this  hysteric  mockery  as  a 
stalking-horse  behind  which  he  may  watch  the  dreadful  situation 
until  he  can  see  how  to  act.  He  not  only  so  resolves,  but  he 
takes  his  comrades  into  his  confidence. 

But  come ; 
Here,  as  before,  never,  so  help  you  mercy. 
How  strange  or  odd  soe'er  I  bear  myself. 
As  I  perchance  hereafter  shall  think  meet 
To  put  an  antic  disposition  on, 
That  you,  at  such  times  seeing  me,  never  shall 
With  arms  encumbered  thus,  or  this  head-shake, 
Or  by  pronouncing  of  some  doubtful  phrase, 
As  '•  Well,  well  we  know,'  or  ^  we  could,  an  if  we  would,' 
Or, '  If  we  list  to  speak,'  or  <  There  be,  an  if  they  might,' 
Or  such  ambiguous  giving  out,  to  note 
That  you  know  aught  of  me  :  this  not  to  do, 
So  grace  and  mercy  at  your  most  need  help  you, 
Swear.* 

The  scenes  that  follow  are  a  simple  carrying  out  of  this  plan : 
like  the  original  Brutus,  Hamlet  hides  behind  an  **  antic  dispo- 

1  Hamlet  I.  ii.  176.  .  8  I.  v,  from  iii. 

2  I.  V.  io6.  4  1.  V.  168. 


TRAGEDY  AS   EQUILIBRIUM   OVERTHROWN  1 93 

sition"  while  he  waits  his  chance  to  act;  at  any  moment  he  can 
drop  his  assumed  wildness. 

Hamlet,  You  are  welcome :  but  my  uncle-father  and  aunt- 
mother  are  deceived. 

Guildenstern.   In  what,  my  dear  lord? 

Hamlet.  I  am  but  mad  north-north-west :  when  the  wind  is 
southerly  I  know  a  hawk  from  a  handsaw.^ 

This  madness  of  Hamlet  then,  assumed  for  a  specific  purpose 
in  the  movement  of  the  story,  serves  also  as  relief :  the  hysterical 
incoherence  of  the  supposed  madman  is  used  to  mock  king  and 
courtier,  and  to  mock  even  Ophelia  herself,  whom  in  the  general 
hollowness  of  all  appearances  Hamlet  has  come  to  doubt.  With 
this  is  combined,  as  in  Lear,  another  form  of  relief,  the  real  mad- 
ness of  Ophelia,  so  piteous  in  its  incoherences.  Nor  is  this  all. 
It  must  be  remembered  that  the  essential  idea  of  rehef  in  tragedy 
is  pot  necessarily  the  mingling  of  comic  with  serious :  any  other 
variation  of  emotional  tone  may  serve,  if  it  is  used  to  break  the 
sustained  sense  of  movement  towards  a  tragic  climax.  Such  an 
emotional  break  may  be  found  in  the  uncanny  thrill  of  the  Ghost 
Scenes,  varying  the  gloomy  with  touches  of  the  horrible.  I  would 
recognise  another  variation  in  the  simulated  passion  of  the  actors ; 
this  is  an  effect  more  obvious  on  the  stage  than  in  the  mere  read- 
ing of  the  drama,  and  Hamlet  himself  seems  to  note  something  of 
the  kind. 

Hamlet.     Is  it  not  monstrous  that  this  player  here, 
But  in  a  fiction,  in  a  dream  of  passion, 
Could  force  his  soul  so  to  his  own  conceit 
That  from  her  working  all  his  visage  wann'd ; 
Tears  in  his  eyes,  distraction  in's  aspect, 
A  broken  voice,  and  his  whole  function  suiting 
With  forms  to  his  conceit?  and  all  for  nothing!  2 

Finally,  in  the  fifth  act  we  have  the  regular  agency  of  relief,  the 
clown,  varied  into  the  form  of  grave-diggers,  and  professional  jest- 

III.  ii.  387.  2 II.  ii.  576. 

o 


194  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

ing  is  turned  upon  the  most  gruesome  of  topics.  If  this  analysis 
be  correct,  we  seem  in  the  play  of  Hamlet  to  have  an  underplot 
of  relief  matter,  appearing  successively  in  five  varied  forms  :  the 
supernatural  awe  of  the  Ghost  Scenes,  the  hysteric  mockery  of 
Hamlet,  the  histrionic  passion  of  the  players,  the  pathetic  madness 
of  Ophelia,  and  the  weird  humour  of  the  grave-diggers. 

Thus  it  appears  that,  as  the  movement  of  tragedy  in  Shakespeare 
is  a  fall  from  greatness,  so  in  its  tone  it  rests  upon  an  overbalanc- 
ing of  emotions :  light  and  dark  do  not  mingle  on  equal  terms,  but 
the  serious  is  relieved  only  that  it  may  thereby  be  the  ii^ore  inten- 
sified. In  all  respects  Shakespearean  comedy  and  Shakespearean 
tragedy  are  the  converse  one  of  the  other,  as  moral  equilibrium 
and  equilibrium  overthrown.  In  comedy  we  watch  human  life 
plunged  it  may  be  in  a  sea  of  troubles,  sure  that  natural  buoyancy 
will  bring  it  again  to  the  surface,  with  an  exhilaration  akin  to 
laughter.  In  tragedy  we  see  human  life  mounting,  but  with  an 
impulse  that  has  disturbed  some  secret  moral  gravitation,  that  will 
niake  the  height  of  the  elevation  only  the  measure  of  the  fall. 


THE  MORAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  HUMOUR 

A  STORY  is  told  of  a  man  who,  being  suddenly  called  upon  to 
say  exactly  what  was  meant  by  humour,  reserved  his  definition 
till  the  next  day;  the  next  day  he  found  he  would  require  a 
week,  at  the  end  of  a  week,  a  month ;  by  that  time  the  subject 
had  so  grown  upon  him  that  he  went  into  the  country  for  a 
whole  year  to  think  it  out ;  at  the  end  of  the  year  he  sold  his 
business,  and  announced  his  intention  of  devoting  the  rest  of 
his  life  to  this  one  question :  shortly  afterward  the  man  died 
of  melancholy.  Humour  is  a  thing  of  so  strange  a  nature  that 
he  who  has  most  of  it  can  least  say  what  it  is ;  while  those  who 
altogether  lack  it  —  and  they  are  not  a  few  —  have  the  advan- 
tage of  never  knowing  their  loss.  Yet  this  difficult  subject 
cannot  be  altogether  ignored  in  the  present  work,  as  a  single_^ 
illustration  will  show.  Falstaff,  the  supreme  humorous  creation 
of  Shakespeare,  is  exhibited  as  violating  every  law  of  righteous- 
ness and  beauty:  we  who  read  love  Falstaff,  yet  in  no  way 
lessen  our  love  of  law.  This  contradiction  of  itself  makes 
humour  a  problem  in  the  moral  system  of  Shakespeare.  It 
can  be  treated  only  in  the  way  of  suggestion. 

Some  light,  though  of  an  uncertain  kind,  may  be  thrown  upon 
the  thing  from  the  word  that  conveys  it.  In  its  ultimate  ety- 
mology the  meaning  of  humour  is  simply  moisture.  The  great 
extension  of  its  import  rests  upon  a  physiological  theory  of  the 
Middle  Ages,  which  made  the  various  juices  of  the  body  the  de- 
termining forces  of  character  ;  the  blood,  phlegm,  choler  inside 
the  human  frame  made  a  man  sanguine,  phlegmatic,  choleric ; 

I9S 


196  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  arrangement  of  these  juices  or  humours  was  his  '  disposi- 
tion,' and  if  they  were  well  mixed  he  was  *  good  tempered  ' ;  the 
visible  sign  of  such  mixture  in  his  face  was  his  'complexion,'  a 
word  which,  as  late  as  the  novels  of  Richardson,  was  syno'ny- 
mous  with  character.  Accordingly  *  humour  '  was  applied  to  the 
whole,  or  the  separate  elements,  of  a  man's  character ;  the  usage 
of  Ben  Jonson,  with  his  Every  Man  in  his  Humour  and  Every 
Man  out  of  his  Humour^  at  once  reflected  and  intensified  the 
tendency  to  apply  the  term  '  humours  '  to  peculiarities  of  in- 
dividual disposition.  Now,  such  individual  peculiarities  are  a 
great  source  of  the  ludicrous ;  again,  the  incongruities  or  hidden 
congruities  in  human  nature,  like  other  incongruities  or  congru- 
ities,  are  a  leading  subject  for  wit  to  play  upon.  Thus  the 
whole  range  of  human  nature,  of  wit,  and  of  the  ludicrous, 
are  all  drawn  within  the  scope  of  this  single  word  '  humour.' 
But  in  the  shiftings  to  and  fro  of  verbal  usage  so  many-sided 
a  word  was  sure  to  become  specialised  more  or  less.  On  the 
one  side,  wit  begins  to  draw  away  from  humour  by  suggesting 
the  cold  intellectual  appreciation  of  singularities,  while  humour 
is  the  emotion  excited  by  them.  At  another  point,  such  things 
as  scorn  and  satire  become  differentiated  by  the  fact  that, 
while  aiming  at  the  ridiculous,  they  also  imply  hostility ;  it  is 
the  great  note  of  humour,  on  the  contrary,  that  it  does  not  lose 
sympathy  with  what  it  ridicules,  and  a  man  is  never  more 
humorous  than  when  he  enjoys  a  laugh  at  his  own  expense. 
But  the  sympathetic  sense  of  the  ludicrous,  which  is  the  specialty 
of  humour,  is  free  to  range  over  the  whole  of  human  nature, 
until,  in  the  humour  of  Thackeray  or  Bret  Harte,  we  often 
laugh  only  to  keep  from  crying.  To  all  of  which  it  may  be 
added,  that  the  original  signification  of  the  word  has  never  been 
altogether  lost,  and  humour  is  always  the  most  fluent  of  all  the 
emotions  that  have  connection  with  the  ludicrous. 

As  a  technical  term  of  the  drama,  the  meaning  of  humour  can 
be  stated  with  more  precision.  It  can  be  approached  through  a 
series  of  steps,  of  which  the  first  step  is  the  conception  of  dra- 


THE  MORAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  HUMOUR  1 97 

matic  tone.  We  must  go  back  to  first  principles.  Drama  is 
not  a  mere  reproduction  of  real  life,  but  is  life  arranged  as  a 
spectacle.  If  we  turn  a  mirror  upon  a  landscape,  we  do  not  get 
a  picture  :  what  we  see  lacks  composition  and  its  perspective. 
There  is  a  similar  perspective  in  drama ;  what  is  presented  is 
disposed  according  to  the  point  of  view  of  the  spectator,  and  to 
produce  effects  in  his  emotional  nature.  The  emotions  in  the 
scene  may  be  the  same  as  the  emotion  to  be  excited  in  the 
spectator,  or  they  may  be  very  different ;  on  the  stage  two  men 
are  seen  flying  at  one  another's  throats,  with  a  woman  standing 
by  and  wringing  her  hands  in  despair,  and  all  the  while  the 
spectator  of  the  play  is  smiling  at  a  comic  situation.  The  term 
expressing  this  emotional  response  in  the  spectator  of  the  drama 
is  'tone.'  Without  seeking  to  define  these  tones  —  of  comic, 
farcical,  tragic,  and  the  like  —  we  have  seen  that  it  is  natural  to 
conceive  a  scale  of  tones,  the  more  serious  taking  place  as 
higher,  the  less  serious  as  lower.  Now  the  foe  of  tone  is  mono- 
tone and  satiety.  Even  in  real  life  it  is  a  fundamental  principle 
of  psychology  that  the  passive  receiving  of  impressions  without 
any  reaction  in  activity  is  dangerous ;  if  we  listen  Sunday  after 
Sunday  to  appeals  from  the  pulpit  without  attempting  to  act 
upon  them,  our  religious  exercises  have  only  made  us  the  more 
callous ;  if  we  for  ever  cherish  sentiments  without  any  effect  on 
our  conduct,  we  dwindle  into  the  sentimental.  But  the  spectator 
in  the  theatre  is  necessarily  passive :  if  one  kind  of  emotional 
appeal  is  continuously  made  to  him  without  variation,  he  must 
soon  become  apathetic.  Hence  the  mixture  of  tones  in  the 
romantic  drama:  comedy  balancing  a  succession  of  different 
emotions  into  harmony,  even  tragedy  relieving  its  serious  tone 
by  what  is  lighter.  From  this  mixture  of  tones  we  may  go  a 
step  farther,  and  recognise  what  may  be  called  tone-clash  : 
opposite  emotions  meet  with  a  shock  in  the  same  effect.  In 
the  physical  body  such  a  clash  of  opposites  makes  hysteria: 
the  mobile  nervous  energy  relieves  itself  by  laughter  and  tears 
together.     So,  as  we  have   seen,  outpourings  of   an   hysteric 


198  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

character  make  an  element  in  the  excited  action  of  Lear  and 
Hamlet.  Or  again,  tone-clash  is  illustrated  in  the  regular  cus- 
tom of  Shakespeare  to  use  puns  in  passages  of  deep  emotion  ;  as 
where  John  of  Gaunt,  dying  of  grief,  receives  the  nephew  who  is 
the  cause  of  it  with  a  string  of  puns  on  his  own  name.^  Criti- 
cism has  often  taken  objection,  on  the  ground  that  puns  are 
things  comic  in  their  nature.  But  it  is  their  comic  character 
that  gives  them  fitness,  not  for  ordinary  situations  of  sadness, 
but  for  agony  that  is  acute :  puns  in  such  cases  are  verbal 
hysterics.  From  these  successive  conceptions  —  of  dramatic 
tones,  scale  of  tones,  mixture  of  tones,  tone-clash  —  we  may  pro- 
ceed to  the  final  conception  of  humour  as  tone-tremulousness, 
like  the  shake  in  music ;  there  is  no  clash  or  shock,  but  diverse 
or  opposite  emotions  come  so  smoothly  together  that  they  flow 
into  a  single  delightful  impression.  We  are  amused  at  the 
violation  of  the  law,  and  yet  are  conscious  of  retaining  our 
respect  for  the  law ;  we  enjoy  Falstaff 's  humiliation,  yet  have  no 
sense  of  triumph  over  the  man ;  we  appreciate  the  grotesque  in 
the  Dogberries  and  Shallows,  yet  do  not  cease  to  feel  that  they 
are  men  and  brethren.  As  a  supreme  effect  for  the  manage- 
ment of  tone  in  drama,  the  fluency  of  humour  holds  contrasted 
emotions  harmonised  in  the  spectator's  sympathy. 

The  humour,  the  dramatic  expression  of  which  is  thus  de- 
scribed, has  a  natural  place  in  a  moral  system.  It  enters  deeply 
into  the  real  life  which  it  is  the  province  of  drama  to  arrange. 
Humour  is  an  emotional  antiseptic  :  the  salt  of  wit  keeps  senti- 
ment healthy,  saves  it  from  the  morbid,  makes  itself  felt  just 
where  the  sweet  is  in  danger  of  becoming  the  mawkish.  It  is 
the  balance-wheel  of  the  sympathies :  every  feeling  indulged  is 
at  the  expense  of  other  feelings,  and  tends  toward  partisanship ; 
in  the  rapid  interplay  of  emotions  humour  is  the  force  that 
staves  off  an  eccentricity  which  would  disturb  regularity.     The 

1  Richard  the  Second  II.  i.  74-85.  For  other  examples  compare  Julius  Ccesar 
III.  i.  204-208;  Merchant  of  Venice  IV.  i.  281;  Macbeth  II.  ii.  56;  Richard  the 
Second  IV.  i.  315. 


THE  MORAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  HUMOUR  1 99 

heart  of  a  whirlpool  is  a  dead  calm  :  humour  is  such  an  indif- 
ference point  in  the  whirlpool  of  the  passions.  It  serves  as  a 
sounding-board  for  taste  :  without  it  the  loud  ring  of  excess 
comes  back  only  in  mocking  echoes.  Humour  thus  enters 
deeply  into  analysis  of  character.  Greek  thought  deified  the 
sense  of  proportion  as  a  moral  force  under  the  name  Nemesis : 
other  powers,  like  Justice,  dealt  with  right  and  wrong,  but 
Nemesis  was  a  providence  which  visited  every  kind  of  excess, 
which  would  strike  down  a  Polycrates  for  being  too  fortunate, 
or  an  Hippolytus  for  being  too  temperate.  Humour  is  such  a 
nemesis  in  human  character,  watching  over  the  proportion  of 
parts,  interposing  to  save  the  '  good '  from  becoming  '  goody.' 
It  must  be  understood  of  course  in  all  these  remarks  that  the 
essential  thing  is  not  humour,  but  the  sense  of  humour ;  the 
question  is  not  of  jocose  expression,  but  of  the  mental  corrective 
force  that  lies  in  an  instinct  against  excess.  Humour  is  thus 
the  great  contribution  of  comedy  to  morals  ;  it  is  a  sort  of  comic 
conscience,  ever  making  for  moral  equilibrium. 

When  life  comes  to  be  arranged  as  a  dramatic  spectacle  the 
scope  of  humour  is  still  further  enlarged.  It  may  sometimes 
manifest  itself  as  a  suspension  of  the  moral  law,  in  the  way  that 
enchantment  is  a  suspension  of  physical  law.  This  temporary 
suspension  of  moral  law  is  a  deep-seated  idea  in  human  nature. 
In  ruder  times  it  manifested  itself  in  such  forms  as  the  Roman 
Saturnalia,  or  mediaeval  Feasts  of  Unreason  ;  the  powers  of 
order  were  tolerant  of  the  single  day  in  the  year  when  slaves 
might  whip  masters,  or  a  mock  pope  travesty  sacred  ritual  — 
rude  expressions  of  a  vague  popular  conception  that  even  God 
must  sometimes  need  a  holiday.  The  more  refined  fluency  of 
humour  can  infuse  into  regular  life  a  single  element  of  the  moral 
Saturnalia ;  relieving  pompous  history  with  by-play  of  an  East- 
cheap,  bad  enough  as  a  reality,  but  excellent  as  a  spectacle. 
Falstaff 's  tavern  bill  with  its  "  one  half-pennyworth  of  bread  to 
this  intolerable  deal  of  sack  "  typifies  the  proportions  of  the 
responsible  and  the  frothy  in  this  humorous  unreason.     Flashes 


200  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

from  Falstaff  himself  are  continually  keeping  us  in  touch  with 
the  idea  of  moral  reversal ;  as  where  the  disgruntled  pedestrian 
threatens  "  to  turn  true  man  and  leave  these  rogues  "  ;  or  where 
he  laments  the  evil  times  : 

There  live  not  three  good  men  unhanged  in  England :  and 
one  of  them  is  fat,  and  grows  old :  God  help  the  while  !  a 
bad  world,  I  say. 

The  moral  topsy-turveydom  of  Eastcheap  has  reached  the  point 
of  paradox. 

Poins.  Jack !  how  agrees  the  devil  and  thee  about  thy  soul, 
that  thou  soldest  him  on  Good  Friday  last  for  a  cup  of  Ma- 
deira and  a  cold  capon's  leg? 

Prince.  Sir  John  stands  to  his  word,  the  devil  shall  have 
his  bargain ;  for  he  was  never  yet  a  breaker  of  proverbs :  he 
will  give  the  devil  his  due. 

Poins.  Then  art  thou  damned  for  keeping  thy  word  with 
the  devil. 

Prince.    Else  he  had  been  damned  for  cozening  the  devil. 

Thus  the  immorality  has  become  a  new  morality,  and  Falstaff 
turns  moraliser.  He  gives  us  a  long  and  ingenious  sermon  on 
the  moral  effects  of  sherry,  which  a  teetotaller  may  admire  as  an 
heresiarch's  masterpiece.^  The  doctrine  of  original  sin  becomes 
a  comfort  to  him. 

Dost  thou  hear,  Hal  ?  thou  knowest  in  the  state  of  innocency 
Adam  fell ;  and  what  should  poor  Jack  Falstaff  do  in  the  days 
of  villany  ?  Thou  seest  I  have  more  flesh  than  another  man ; 
and  therefore  more  frailty. 

We  even  hear  him  solemnly  discoursing  on  the  vanity  of  life : 
only  he  means,  the  life  of  honour. 

Prince.    Why,  thou  owest  God  a  death. 
Falstaff.     'Tis  not  due  yet;   I  would  be  loth  to  pay  him 
before  his  day.     What  need  I  be  so  forward  with  him  that 

1  Second  Part  of  Henry  the  Fourth :  IV.  iii,  from  92. 


THE  MORAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  HUMOUR  201 

calls  not  on  me?  Well,  'tis  no  matter;  honour  pricks  me  on. 
Yea,  but  how  if  honour  prick  me  off  when  I  come  on?  how 
then  ?  Can  honour  set  to  a  leg  ?  no :  or  an  arm  ?  no :  or  take 
away  the  grief  of  a  wound?  no.  Honour  hath  no  skill  in 
surgery,  then?  no.  What  is  honour?  a  word.  What  is  in 
that  word  honour?  what  is  that  honour?  air.  A  trim  reck- 
oning! Who  hath  it?  he  that  died  o'  Wednesday.  Doth  he 
feel  it?  no.  Doth  he  hear  it?  no.  'Tis  insensible,  then. 
Yea,  to  the  dead.  But  will  it  not  live  with  the  living?  no. 
Why?  detraction  will  not  suffer  it.  Therefore  I'll  none  of  it. 
Honour  is  a  mere  scutcheon :  and  so  ends  my  catechism. 

Humour  is  often  occupied  with  the  ways  of  human  nature. 
Zoology  gravely  studies  the  ways  of  animals :  not  merely  the 
structures  of  their  skeletons  as  an  element  in  comparative 
anatomy,  but  the  lightest  turn  of  habit  and  custom,  as  that  one 
spider  spreads  a  web,  another  lives  in  a  box  with  a  lid  to  it. 
The  ways  of  the  animal  man  have  a  similar  interest,  even  the 
infinite  variations  of  individuality :  how  carriers  talk  with  ostlers 
in  free  slang;  how  a  tavern  hostess  adapts  herself  to  imprac- 
ticable guests ;  distracted  drawers  flinging  '  anons '  in  every 
direction ;  what  permutations  of  the  human  scarecrow  can  be 
mustered  into  Falstaff 's  company  of  soldiers ;  what  combinations 
of  social  absurdities  can  hold  revel  in  Shallow's  orchard.  In  a 
Doll  Tearsheet  wit  can  turn  its  light  upon  the  crudest  humanity, 
as  pictorial  art  can  give  us  a  Dutch  genre  picture.  Mine  host's 
practical  joke  in  the  Merry  Wives  is  a  zoological  experiment 
that  brings  the  oddities  of  a  parson  Evans  and  a  Doctor  Caius 
into  just  the  best  situation  for  fully  displaying  themselves.  And 
Prince  Henry  is  a  diligent  zoological  observer,  who  can  repro- 
duce "  all  humours  that  have  showed  themselves  humours  since 
the  old  days  of  goodman  Adam  to  the  pupil  age  of  this  present 
twelve  o'clock  at  midnight." 

But  besides  these  indifferent  things  vice  itself  may  be  a  spec- 
tacle ;  there  is  an  interest  of  monstrosity  in  morals,  as  in  art  the 
grotesque  is  a  form  of  beauty.  The  sins  of  the  nursery  have  to 
be  restrained,  because  they  are  great  things  to  the  little  sinners: 


202  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

but,  once  the  nursery  door  is  closed,  the  adult  spectator  has  his 
keen  enjoyment  of  the  joke.  So  at  the  other  end  of  the  scale, 
vice  passes  beyond  the  danger  point,  and  becomes  nothing  but 
spectacle.  Only,  the  perspective  of  the  picture  must  be  so 
arranged  that  the  spectator  really  is  at  the  indifference  point; 
criticism  cannot  say  how  this  is  to  be  done,  any  more  than  it  can 
direct  a  portrait  painter  how  to  catch  a  likeness,  yet  to  miss  this 
is  to  make  art  immoral.  Dramatised  vice  is  a  demonstration  in 
moral  pathology.  In  physiology,  the  disease  which  may  be  fatal 
to  the  individual  patient  becomes  a  thing  of  cool  interest  to  the 
medical  expert,  who  rather  prefers  a  compound  fracture  to  a 
sprain,  and  may  become  enthusiastic  over  the  virulent  destruc- 
tiveness  of  a  cancerous  tissue.  There  is  nothing  strange  in  this, 
for  disease  is  a  manifestation  of  life  as  much  as  health.  But 
the  doctors  watching  their  pathological  curiosities  in  the  fever 
hospital  take  measures  to  guard  themselves  from  infection.  So 
humour  is  the  great  moral  disinfectant,  with  its  fluent  sympathy 
alike  for  the  pathological  oddity  and  for  the  perfect  health.  It 
is  not  the  depicting  of  vice  that  makes  literature  immoral ;  cor- 
rupt art  is  the  maladroit  art  which,  presenting  less  or  more  of 
vice,  is  clumsy  enough  to  leave  unneutralised  some  of  the  infec- 
tion, to  lay  hold  of  some  unwary  reader.  It  is  best  to  leave  such 
art  as  this  to  die  the  natural  death  of  corrupt  things.  Unfortu- 
nately, its  denunciation  is  often  undertaken  by  persons  who 
have  lost  their  humour  touch,  whose  sympathies  have  become 
set  and  cannot  be  made  elastic.  Such  persons  are  a  social 
danger,  as  false  prophets  who  unfortunately  have  the  means  of 
fulfilling  their  own  prophecies.  For  life  is  full  of  things  which 
are  innocent  if  left  to  themselves,  but  become  noxious  by  merely 
having  a  finger  pointed  at  them ;  if  corrupt  art  has  injured  its 
thousands,  discussions  of  corruption  have  injured  tens  of  thou- 
sands. Humour  is  an  essential  for  a  censor  of  morals ;  no  one 
is  in  a  state  to  discuss  literary  morality  unless  he  can  lay  his 
hand  on  his  heart  and  vow  that  he  loves  Shakespeare's  Falstaff. 
History  amply  confirms  the  principle  thus  laid  down.     Short- 


THE  MORAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  HUMOUR  203 

comings  of  this  kind  wrought  havoc  with  the  greatest  religious 
revolution  in  modern  history :  Puritanism  was  religion  that  had 
lost  its  sense  of  humour. 

In  this  way  Falstaff  is  a  pathological  triumph.  His  vast  bulk 
is  a  perpetual  symbol  of  monstrosity :  he  is  a  creature  of  bombast ; 
unhorsed,  he  *  frets  like  a  gummed  velvet,'  he  — 

sweats  to  death, 
And  lards  the  lean  earth  as  he  walks  along ; 

only  a  colossus  could  be  the  friend  to  bestride  him  in  the  battle  ; 
he  marches  in  front  of  his  slim  page  "  like  a  sow  that  hath 
overw^helmed  all  her  litter  but  one  " ;  pitched  into  the  Thames 
he  has  "  a  kind  of  alacrity  in  sinking"  ;  in  the  wars  he  prays  — 

God  keep  lead  out  of  me !  I  need  no  more  weight  than  mine 
own  bowels. 

Huge  in  body,  brilliant  in  mind,  he  has  a  soul  that  has  forgotten 
to  grow  up :  the  elephantine  senior  bids  travellers  stand  with 
a  — 

What,  ye  knaves !  young  men  must  live. 

He  must  needs  be  a  lad  with  the  other  Eastcheap  lads,  a  "latter 
spring"  in  the  boisterous  irresponsible  young  manhood  which  is 
an  unconscious  prolongation  of  the  nursery  life.  But  nature 
abhors  a  monstrosity ;  great  part  of  the  humour  of  the  scenes  is 
made  by  the  real  youth  repelling  the  artificial,  the  natural  lads 
setting  on  the  ugly  duckling  who  has  come  among  them,  until 
even  a  Doll  Tearsheet,  as  she  ogles  Falstaff,  insinuatingly  asks, 
when  he  will  "  leave  fighting  o'  days  and  foining  o'  nights,  and 
begin  to  patch  up  his  old  body  for  heaven."  But  he  is  assailed 
in  vain :  Falstaff  holds  the  champion's  belt  for  all  of  the  seven 
deadly  sins  that  do  not  require  exertion.  Like  the  pupils  with 
the  fencing  master,  the  comrades  of  the  old  knight  make  their 
fiercest  attacks  on  him  only  for  the  purpose  of  drawing  out  his 
irresistible  fence.     Pelion  upon  Ossa  of  shame  is  heaped  upon 


204  THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

him,  but  his  audacity  of  unabashedness  refuses  to  be  crushed ; 
he  is  flung  into  seas  of  discomfiture,  but  the  elasticity  of  false- 
hood brings  him  up  again.  All  the  while  we  are  doing  involun- 
tary homage  to  the  strength  of  moral  law  in  our  amused  surprise 
at  the  colossal  invention  that  can  rise  superior  to  it.  Art  is 
always  the  conquest  of  some  material :  in  the  humorous  arj  of 
these  plays  moral  order  has  become  the  stubborn  material  which 
is  being  bent  to  spectacular  effect,  as  the  convicted  liar  ever 
gets  the  better  of  the  convincing  truth.  And  this  heroism  of 
moral  insensibility  is  continued  to  the  very  end,  even  to  the 
point  where  the  dream  spectacle  is  to  reach  the  inevitable  wak- 
ing point.  The  riotous  Prince  Hal  has  become  the  magnificent 
King  Henry ;  the  Falstaff  crew  have  ridden  post  haste  to  Lon- 
don, with  the  aid  of  a  thousand  pounds  borrowed  from  Shallow, 
to  enjoy  the  grand  things  Falstaff  has  guaranteed  them  all  from 
his  newly  exalted  chum.  The  meeting  has  come,  and  the  blow 
has  fallen ;  we  turn  to  hear  the  first  words  of  a  crushed  man  : 
and  what  we  hear  is  one  more  flash  of  the  old  humour  — 

Falstaff.     Master  Shallow,  I  owe  you  a  thousand  pound. 

To  all  this  it  may  be  added  that  humour  includes  wit,  though 
the  two  things  are  not  conterminous.  Wit  is  the  finest  and 
brightest  form  of  mental  play ;  the  brain  has  its  technique,  and 
Falstaff  is  the  Paganini  of  humour.  It  needs  but  an  appro- 
priate theme,  and  some  tour-de-force  of  inexhaustible  invention 
comes  pouring  out. 

Bardolph.  Why,  you  are  so  fat,  Sir  John,  that  you  must 
needs  be  out  of  all  compass,  out  of  all  reasonable  compass,  Sir 
John. 

Falstaff.  Do  thou  amend  thy  face,  and  I'll  amend  my  life; 
thou  art  our  admiral,  thou  bearest  the  lantern  in  the  poop,  but 
'tis  in  the  nose  of  thee ;  thou  art  the  Knight  of  the  Burning 
Lamp. 

Bardolph.   Why,  Sir  John,  my  face  does  you  no  harm. 

Falstaff.  No,  Til  be  sworn ;  I  make  as  good  a  use  of  it  as 
many  a  man  doth  of  a  Death's-head  or  a  memento  mori ;  I 


THE  MORAL  SIGNIFICANCE  OF  HUMOUR  205 

never  see  thy  face  but  I  think  upon  hell-fire,  and  Dives  that 
lived  in  purple ;  for  there  he  is  in  his  robes,  burning,  burning. 
If  thou  wert  any  way  given  to  virtue,  I  would  swear  by  thy 
face ;  my  oath  should  be,  '  By  this  fire,  that's  God's  angel ' : 
but  thou  art  altogether  given  over ;  and  wert  indeed,  but  for 
the  light  in  thy  face,  the  son  of  utter  darkness.  When  thou 
rannest  up  Gadshill  in  the  night  to  catch  my  horse,  if  I  did 
not  think  thou  hadst  been  an  ignis  fatuus  or  a  ball  of  wildfire, 
there's  no  purchase  in  money.  O,  thou  art  a  perpetual  triumph, 
an  everlasting  bonfire-light.  Thou  hast  saved  me  a  thousand 
marks  in  links  and  torches,  walking  with  thee  in  the  night 
betwixt  tavern  and  tavern ;  but  the  sack  that  thou  hast  drimk 
me  would  have  bought  me  lights  as  good  cheap  at  the  dearest 
chandler's  in  Europe.  I  have  maintained  that  salamander  of 
yours  with  fire  any  time  this  two  and  thirty  years  ;  God  reward 
me  for  it ! 

Bardolph.   'Sblood,  I  would  my  face  were  in  your  belly  ! 

Falstaff.  God-a-mercy!  so  should  I  be  sure  to  be  heart- 
burned. 

The  prince  meets  Falstaff  on  equal  terms,  and  their  duets  are 
masterpieces  of  mental  fencing.  But,  as  Falstaff  himself  says, 
he  is  not  only  witty,  but  "  the  cause  that  wit  is  in  other  men  "; 
right  through  the  Falstaff  plays  there  runs  an  electric  storm  of 
brilliance.  Even  the  malapropism  of  the  hostess  catches  it,  and 
the  stage  rant  of  Pistol ;  we  are  taught  elsewhere  that  murder 
may  be  considered  as  a  fine  art,  but  when  Pistol  is  matched 
against  Doll  Tearsheet  we  have  to  recognise  that  there  is  a  fine 
art  of  scurrility.  At  times  the  wit  becomes  the  regular  fooling 
of  the  Shakespearean  jester.  The  prince  and  Falstaff  have  a 
clown  duet : 

Prince.  This  sanguine  coward,  this  bed-presser,  this  horse- 
back-breaker, this  huge  hill  of  flesh,  — 

Falstaff.  'Sblood,  you  starveling,  you  elf-skin,  you  dried 
neat's  tongue,  you  stockfish !  O  for  breath  to  utter  what  is 
like  thee !  you  tailor's-yard,  you  sheath,  you  bow-case,  you  vile 
standing-tuck,  — 


206  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF   SHAKESPEARE 

Touchstone    himself    could    not  have    bettered    the    prince's 
mystification  of  the  drawer:^ 

Prince,    But,  Francis! 

Francis.     My  lord? 

Prince.  Wilt  thou  rob  this  leathern  jerkin,  crystal-button, 
not-pated,  agate-ring,  puke-stocking,  caddis-garter,  smooth- 
tongue,  Spanish-pouch, — 

Francis.    O  Lord,  sir,  who  do  you  mean  ? 

Prince.  Why,  then,  your  brown  bastard  is  your  only  drink ; 
for,  look  you,  Francis,  your  white  canvas  doublet  will  sully  :  in 
Barbary,  sir,  it  cannot  come  to  so  much. 

Francis.    What,  sir? 

Poins.     \Within\     Francis  ! 

Prince.     Away,  you  rogue!  dost  thou  not  hear  them  call? 

[Here  they  both  call  him ;  the  drawer  stands 
aniazed,  not  knowing  which  way  to  go. 

But  with  the  Shakespearean  inspiration  even  foolery  is  a  vent 
for  mental  wealth  ;    nonsense  is  simply  sense  boiling  over. 

But  enough  has  been  written  on  this  topic  —  I  fear,  too  much  ; 
it  savours  of  an  offence  against  humour  to  seek  for  it  a  place  in 
moral  economics.  I  hasten  to  conclude  this  chapter,  not  with- 
out suspicion  that  I  shall  seem  to  have  been  training  artillery 
upon  an  ignis  fatuus,  and  demonstrating  my  own  lack  of  humour 
by  undertaking  to  discuss  it. 

1  First  Part  of  Henry  the  Fourth :  \\.  iv,  from  4a 


BOOK   III 

THE  FORCES   OF  LIFE  IN  SHAKESPEARE'S 
MORAL    WORLD 

Chapter       XI :   Personality  and  its  Dramatic  Expression  in  Intrigue 
and  Irony 

Chapter     XII :   The  Momentum  of  Character  and  the  Sway  of  Cir- 
cumstance 

Chapter  XIII :   The  Pendulum  of  History 

Chapter  XIV  :    Supernatural  Agency  in  Shakespeare's  Moral  World 

Chapter    XV :   Moral  Accident  and  Overruling  Providence 


XI 


PERSONALITY  AND  ITS  DRAMATIC  EXPRESSION  IN  INTRIGUE 
AND  IRONY 

We  pass,  in  this  Third  Book,  from  the  phenomena  of  life  to 
the  forces  which  underlie  it ;  so  far  at  least  as  such  forces  of  life 
are  reflected  in  dramatic  forms.  The  most  obvious  of  all  the 
forces  entering  into  human  life  is  that  which  we  call  Will : 
personal,  individual  will.  Of  course,  to  recognise  will  as  a 
force  is  not  to  say  that  such  will  is  necessarily  effective  or  free. 
Muscular  power  is  a  force :  but  I  may  have  exerted  all  the  mus- 
cular power  in  my  body  in  an  attempt  to  move  toward  the 
north,  all  the  while  that  stronger  muscles  than  my  own  were 
carrying  me  to  the  south ;  my  muscular  power  was  not  free,  and 
was  the  reverse  of  effective,  yet  it  was  none  the  less  a  force. 
Similarly,  the  power  of  individual  will  may  be  restrained  in  its 
operation  by  forces  from  outside ;  or  even  the  will  may  un- 
consciously have  been  restrained  by  other  forces  within  the 
individual,  so  that  his  consciousness  of  free  will  may  prove  to 
have  been  a  self-deception.  The  present  chapter  is  occupied 
with  the  force  of  will ;  restraints  of  will  from  within  or  from 
without  are  reserved  for  the  chapters  that  follow. 

Our  immediate  question  then  becomes  this :  Is  there  any  ele- 
ment of  dramatic  effect  which  is  specially  associated  with  the 
force  of  personal  will?  An  answer  will  readily  suggest  itself. 
Scarcely  any  form  of  dramatic  interest  is  more  prominent  than 
that  called  Intrigue.  Now  Intrigue  is  an  expression  of  personal 
will  in  a  very  pronounced  form  :  the  term  implies  conscious  pur- 
pose, sustained  plan,  some  amount  of  effort  in  the  application  of 
p  209 


210  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

means  to  ends ;  often  secrecy  and  finesse  are  associated  with 
Intrigue,  but  these  are  not  essential.  In  The  Merchant  of  Venice 
both  Lorenzo  and  Bassanio  are  seen  wooing.  Lorenzo's  wooing 
of  Jessica  is,  dramatically,  an  intrigue  :  effort  and  contrivance  are 
necessary  to  carry  off  the  Jewess  without  her  father's  consent. 
But  Bassanio's  wooing  does  not  make  an  intrigue,  for,  upon  the  face 
of  things,  the  issue  does  not  depend  upon  Bassanio's  will  or  effort, 
but  upon  fate  or  chance ;  the  dramatic  interest  of  the  Caskets 
Story  must  be  referred  to  some  other  head  —  it  is  a  problem  and 
its  solution. 

/  We  may  go  farther.  As  soon  as  individual  will  translates  itself 
into  action,  it  is  sure  to  come  into  conflict  with  other  individual 
wills.  This  leads  us  to  another  among  the  prominent  forms  of 
dramatic  iriterest  —  Troni-     Etymologically,  this  is  a  Greek  word 

^"^rsaytng,  more  particularly,  saying  as  distinct  from  meaning: 
hence  its  suggestion  is  a  doubleness  of  significance,  at  first  in 
words,  subsequently  in  situations  or  events.  The  word  had  great 
vogue  in  Greek  tragedy,  which  dramatised  stories  perfectly  fa- 
miliar to  the  audience  as  the  sacred  myths  of  their  gods ;  hence 
the  spectator  in  the  Greek  theatre  knew  all  through  the  movement 
what  the  end  of  the  story  must  be,  and  from  time  to  time  words 
spoken  in  the  scenes  would  have  an  '  irony/  from  the  spectator's 
knowledge  of  the  sequel  clashing  with  the  unconsciousness  of  this 
sequel  on  the  part  of  the  personages  in  the  story.  Thus  (Edipus 
is  heard  vowing  to  move  heaven  and  earth  for  the  discovery  of  the 
man  indicated  by  the  oracle  as  having  polluted  the  city,  and 
the  audience  feel  a  thrill  of  irony,  for  they  know  the  polluter  will 
be  discovered  to  be  CEdipus  himself,  though  at  that  point  of  the 
story  he  knows  it  not.  Coming  down  from  Greek  to  modern 
drama,  the  term  *  irony '  enlarges  to  include  in  a  general  sense  the 
shocks  and  clashes  between  one  aspect  and  another  of  soma 
double  situation,  the  whole  grasped  by  the  spectator,  only  paKV 
known  to  some  at  least  of  the  personages  in  the  scene.  Thus 
irony  is  closely  associated  with  dramatic  intrigue ;  it  obtains 
where  intrigue  clashes  with  intrigue,  or  the  course  of  an  intrigue 


) 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  2X1 

clashes  with  some  external  circumstance,  or  something  in  the 
character  of  the  persons  concerned.  In  the  play  of  Measure  for^ 
Measure  we  have  the  intrigue  of  Angelo  to  use  secretly  his  power 
over  her  brother's  life  as  a  means  of  forcing  Isabella  to  his  will ; 
we  have  again  the  secret  intrigue  of  the  disguised  Duke  to  substi- 
tute Mariana  for  Isabella ;  yet  again  we  are  aware  of  the  circum- 
stance that  Mariana  had  been  the  betrothed  bride  of  Angelo 
disgracefully  cast  off:  these  three  things  clash  together  in  the 
spectator's  mind  as  the  dramatic  interest  of , irony,  when  he  sees 
a  man  unconsciously  redeem  a  former  sin  in  the  very  act  (as  he 
supposes)  of  committing  a  new  crime.  Again,  there  is  another 
secret  intrigue  of  Angelo  to  hurry  the  execution  of  Claudio  when 
(as  he  supposes)  he  has  gained  the  prize  for  which  he  promised 
pardon ;  this  is  met  by  a  counter  intrigue  of  the  Duke  to  substi- 
tute for  Claudio  another  victim.^  The  irony  latent  in  this  clash 
of  intrigues  comes  to  the  surface  in  the  final  scene,  when  the 
exposed  Angelo,  after  having  been  saved  from  his  first  danger, 
and  appearing  as  the  husband  of  Mariana,  is  sentenced  to  death 
for  the  foul  treachery  to  Claudio ;  ^  Mariana,  up  to  this  point  in 
league  with  the  Duke,  is  now  plunged  in  tragic  dismay,  and  with 
Isabella  pleads  passionately  for  the  hfe  of  the  husband  that 
moment  granted  her :  all  the  while  that  the  Duke  is  prolonging 
this  strained  situation  the  spectator  of  the  drama  has  the  clue  in 
his  possession  that  will  make  all  straight.  In  the  same  play  there 
is  a  dramatic  intrigue  in  the  Duke's  hovering,  disguised  as  a 
Friar,  about  the  scenes  from  which  he  is  supposed  to  be  at 
a  distance ;  this  intrigue  comes  in  contact  \jith  the  personality  of 
Lucio,^  ^d-the  spectator '"catches  a  shock  of  irony  as  Lucio 
confides  to  the  Friar  his  low  opinion  of  the  Duke ;  the  spectator 
catches  another  shock  of  irony  as  the  disguised  Duke  leads  on 
Lucio  to  confess  to  him  misdemeanours  of  his  own  which  will  be 
used  presently  when  the  Duke  resumes  his  seat  of  judgment.  It 
is  obvious  enough  that  intrigue  and  irony  naturally  go  together  in 

1  Measure  for  Measure  IV.  ii,  from  95.  2  y.  i,  from  405. 

8III.  ii,  from4S;  V.  i. 


212  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  moral  system  of  a  dramatic  literature  :  as  intrigue  is  specially 
consecrated  to  the  dramatic  expression  of  individual  will,  so  irony 
has  the  function  of  conveying  the  clash  of  individual  wills  with  one 
another  or  with  circumstances. 

In  connection  with  this  part  of  our  subject  no  play  of  Shake- 
speare is  more  brilliant  than  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew}  It  has 
a  primary  and  a  secondary  plot :  the  first  is  occupied  with  the 
wooing  of  Katherine,  the  shrew ;  the  second  with  the  wooing  of 
her  sister  Bianca,  a  natural  and  winsome  girl.  Three  suitors  are 
seeking  the  hand  of  this  Bianca ;  their  suits  are  made  intrigues 
by  the  circumstance  that  her  widower  father,  burdened  with  the 
task  of  finding  husbands  for  his  two  children,  has  hit  upon  the 
ingenious  plan  of  announcing  to  his  world  that  he  will  receive 
no  overture  for  Bianca  until  her  shrewish  elder  sister  is  married ; 
this  forces  Bianca's  lovers  to  use  secrecy  and  contrivance.  It 
might  seem  as  if  this  secondary  plot,  with  a  triple  intrigue  and 
all  its  possibilities  of  irony,  would  overbalance  the  primary  plot. 
But  what  this  last  lacks  in  quantity  it  makes  up  for  in  quality ; 
the  wooing  of  Katherine  is  saturated  through  and  through,  not 
exactly  with  irony,  but  with  a  dramatic  quality  akin  to  irony  — 
the  interest  of  paradox. 

We  naturally  woo  that  which  is  attractive;  Petruchio  para- 
doxically undertakes  to  win  what  is  repellent. 

Gremio.      But  will  you  woo  this  wild-cat  ? 

Petruchio.  Will  I  live?  .  .  . 

Why  came  I  hither  but  to  that  intent  ? 
Think  you  a  little  din  can  daunt  mine  ears  ? 
Have  I  not  in  my  time  heard  lions  roar  ? 
Have  I  not  heard  the  sea  pufF'd  up  with  winds 
Rage  like  an  angry  boar  chafed  with  sweat  ? 
Have  I  not  heard  great  ordnance  in  the  field, 
And  heaven's  artillery  thunder  in  the  skies  ? 
Have  I  not  in  a  pitched  battle  heard 
Loud  'larums,  neighing  steeds,  and  trumpets'  clang  ? 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  page  344. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  213 

And  do  you  tell  me  of  a  woman's  tongue, 
That  gives  not  half  so  great  a  blow  to  hear 
As  will  a  chestnut  in  a  farmer's  fire  ? 

The  method  of  the  wooing  is  even  more  paradoxical  than  the 
purpose  to  woo.  Petruchio  may  be  described  as  a  social 
'  hustler ' :  he  has  all  the  hustler's  accentuated  egoism,  and 
understands  the  force  of  mere  social  momentum.  He  sets  him- 
self to  reverse  everything  expected  of  the  conventional  wooer ; 
in  the  bewilderment  that  ensues  he  will  sweep  resistance  off  its 
feet  by  the  resolute  pace  of  his  movements.  While  Katherine's 
shrewishness  is  the  common  talk  of  the  city,  Petruchio  announces 
himself  to  the  father  as  a  suitor  attracted  by  — 

Her  affability  and  bashful  modesty, 

Her  wondrous  qualities,  and  mild  behaviour. 

The  delighted  Baptista  must  nevertheless  adjourn  the  interview, 
as  other  guests  are  present,  but  the  hustler  cannot  wait. 

Signior  Baptista,  my  business  asketh  haste, 
And  every  day  I  cannot  come  to  woo. 

Katherine  is  sent  for ;  in  a  parenthesis  of  soliloquy  Petruchio 
unfolds  his  system  of  paradox. 

Say  that  she  rail ;  why  then  I'll  tell  her  plain 

She  sings  as  sweetly  as  a  nightingale  : 

Say  that  she  frown ;  I'll  say  she  looks  as  clear 

As  morning  roses  newly  wash'd  with  dew ; 

Say  she  be  mute  and  will  not  speak  a  word ; 

Then  I'll  commend  her  volubility. 

And  say  she  uttereth  piercing  eloquence : 

If  she  do  bid  me  pack,  I'll  give  her  thanks, 

As  though  she  bid  me  stay  by  her  a  week ; 

If  she  deny  to  wed,  I'll  crave  the  day 

When  I  shall  ask  the  banns,  and  when  be  married. 


214  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

A  stormy  scene  ensues,  but  Petruchio  will  see  nothing  stormy. 

I  find  you  passing  gentle, 
'Twas  told  me  you  were  rough  and  coy  and  sullen, 
And  now  I  find  report  a  very  liar ; 
For  thou  art  pleasant,  gamesome,  passing  courteous, 
But  slow  in  speech,  yet  sweet  as  spring-time  flowers. 

The  shrew  lets  off  her  rage  against  this  wooer  to  the  assembling 
company,  but  Petruchio  is  unmoved. 

Petru.        If  she  be  curst,  it  is  for  policy, 

For  she's  not  froward,  but  modest  as  the  dove  .  .  . 

And  to  conclude,  we  have  'greed  so  well  together, 

That  upon  Sunday  is  the  wedding-day. 
Kath.         ril  see  thee  hang'd  on  Sunday  first. 
Gremio.     Hark,  Petruchio ;  she  says  she'll  see  thee  hang'd  first. 
Tranio.      Is  this  your  speeding  ?  nay,  then,  good  night  our  part  ! 
Petru.        Be  patient,  gentlemen  ;  I  choose  her  for  myself  : 

If  she  and  I  be  pleased,  what's  that  to  you  ? 

'Tis  bargain'd  '  twixt  us  twain,  being  alone, 

That  she  shall  still  be  curst  in  company. 

Whirled  at  this  pace  to  a  wedding-day,  the  shrew,  with  no  dis- 
tinct plan  of  resistance,  can  only  find  a  fresh  grievance  in  her 
proposed  bridegroom  keeping  her  waiting :  after  a  while  this  is 
lost  in  a  tour-de-force  of  paradox. 

Petruchio  is  coming  in  a  new  hat  and  an  old  jerkin,  a  pair 
of  old  breeches  thrice  turned,  a  pair  of  boots  that  have  been 
candle-cases,  one  buckled,  another  laced,  an  old  rusty  sword 
ta'en  out  of  the  town-armoury,  with  a  broken  hilt,  and  chape- 
less  ;  with  two  broken  points ;  his  horse  hipped  with  an  old 
mothy  saddle  and  stirrups  of  no  kindred ;  besides,  possessed 
with  the  glanders  and  like  to  mose  in  the  chine  ;  troubled  with 
the  lampass,  infected  with  the  fashions,  full  of  windgalls,  sped 
with  spavins,  rayed  with  the  yellows,  past  cure  of  the  fives, 
stark  spoiled  with  the  staggers,  begnawn  with  the  bets, 
swayed  in  the  back  and  shoulder-shotten ;  near-legged  before 
and  with  a  half-checked  bit  and  a  head-stall  of  sheep's  leather 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND  IRONY  ±1$ 

which,  being  restrained  to  keep  him  from  stumbling,  hath 
been  often  burst  and  now  repaired  with  knots ;  one  girth  six 
times  pieced  and  a  woman's  crupper  of  velure,  which  hath 
two  letters  for  her  name  fairly  set  down  in  studs,  and  here  and 
there  pieced  with  pack-thread. 

Even  the  anxious  father  has  to  remonstrate,  but  Petruchio  will 
not  explain. 

To  me  she's  married,  not  unto  my  clothes. 

How  the  momentum  of  Petruchio's  wildness  gets  the  parties  into 
the  church  we  can  only  conjecture,  for  that  part  of  the  story 
goes  on  behind  the  scenes  ;  but  the  proceedings  in  the  church 
are  related  by  Gremio :  how  the  mad  bridegroom  swears  his 
*  ay  '  so  loud  that  the  priest  drops  the  book,  and  is  cuffed  as  he 
picks  it  up  again  ;  how  he  ends  by  drinking  a  health,  and  throws 
the  sops  in  the  sexton's  face.  Katherine  at  last  wakes  up  her 
resistance  when  the  newly  wedded  man  will  go  away  on  unex- 
plained business  before  the  wedding  feast;  Petruchio  sweeps 
away  the  resisting  bride  as  in  a  fervour  of  delivering  gallantry. 

Grumio, 
Draw  forth  thy  weapon,  we  are  beset  with  thieves ; 
Rescue  thy  mistress,  if  thou  be  a  man. 
Fear  not,  sweet  wench,  they  shall  not  touch  thee,  Kate ; 
I'll  buckler  thee  against  a  million. 

The  paradoxical  taming  is  continued  at  home. 

Katherine.    I,  who  never  knew  how  to  entreat, 

Nor  never  needed  that  I  should  entreat, 
Am  starved  for  meat,  giddy  for  lack  of  sleep ; 
With  oaths  kept  waking,  and  with  brawling  fed ; 
And  that  which  spites  me  more  than  all  these  wants. 
He  does  it  under  name  of  perfect  love ; 
As  who  should  say,  if  I  should  sleep  or  eat, 
'Twere  deadly  sickness  or  else  present  death.* 

1  Tammg  of  Shrew  iV.  iii.  & 


2l6  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  paradoxical  conclusion  of  this  primary  plot  is  that  the  tamed 
shrew  reads  to  the  mild  Bianca  and  other  normal  wives  a  long 
lecture  on  wifely  submissiveness. 

What  the  interest  of  paradox  is  to  the  primary,  the  interest  of 
irony  is  to  the  secondary  plot.  As  we  have  seen,  three  lovers 
make  conflicting  suits  for  the  hand  of  the  pretty  Bianca  :  Hor- 
tensio  is  a  neighbour :  Gremio  has  the  common  combination  of 
age  with  wealth  ;  Lucentio  is  a  newcomer  to  Padua,  and  with 
him  it  is  a  case  of  love  at  first  sight.^  All  three  lovers  have  to 
make  their  approach  indirectly.  Hortensio,  in  return  for  intro- 
ducing his  friend  Petruchio  as  a  suitor  for  Katherine,  arranges 
that  his  friend  shall  introduce  himself  disguised  as  a  teacher  of 
music  for  Bianca.  Gremio  on  his  part  will  have  an  agent  for 
his  interests  among  Bianca's  teachers.  But  Lucentio,  in  scholar'^ 
disguise,  applies  for  this  agency:  already  we  get  our  first  flash i 
of  irony  as  Gremio  unconsciously  introduces  into  the  circle  of| 
Bianca's  instructors  his  dangerous  rival.  As  the  story  pro- 
gresses, a  situation  of  prolonged  irony  appears :  the  disguised 
rivals  have  to  carry  on  their  wooing  in  the  presence  of  one 
another.^  The  fair  pupil  has*  some  trouble  to  keep  the  peace 
between  her  masters ;  she  sets  the  musician  to  getting  his  diffi- 
cult instrument  in  order,  while  the  teacher  of  poetry  has  his 
chance. 

Lucentio.     *  Hie  ibat  Simois ;  hie  est  Sigeia  tellus ; 
Hie  steterat  Priami  regia  celsa  senis.' 

*Hic  ibat,'  as  I  told  you  before, — *  Simois,'  I  am  Lucentio, 
—  *  hie  est,'  son  unto  Vincentio  of  Pisa,  —  *  Sigeia  tellus,'  dis- 
guised thus  to  get  your  love ;  —  *  Hie  steterat,'  and  that  Lu- 
centio that  eomes  a-wooing,  —  <  Priami,'  is  my  man  Tranio,  — 
*  regia,'  bearing  my  port,  —  *  celsa  senis,'  that  we  might  beguile 
the  old  pantaloon. 

Bianca  tries  if  she  has  learned  her  lesson. 

'^Taming  of  Shrew  \.  i.  152,  and  whole  scene.  *  IIL  i. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  21/ 

*  Hie  ibat  Simois,'  I  know  you  not,  — '  hie  est  Sigeia  tellus/ 
I  trust  you  not, —  *  Hie  steterat  Priami,'  take  heed  he  hear  us 
not,  — '  regia,'  presume  not,  —  *  celsa  senis  '  despair  not. 

The  music-teacher  in  his  turn  begs  Bianca  to  read  a  new  gamut, 
newer  than  anything  taught  in  his  trade  before  —  the  gamut  of 
Hortensio. 

Bianca  (reads)       "  *  Gamut '  I  am,  the  ground  of  all  accord, 
'  A  re,'  to  plead  Hortensio's  passion ; 

*  B  mi,'  Bianca,  take  him  for  thy  lord, 

'  C  fa  ut,'  that  loves  with  all  affection : 

*  D  sol  re,'  one  clef,  two  notes  have  I : 

*  E  la  mi,'  show  pity,  or  I  die." 
Call  you  this  gamut  ?  tut,  I  like  it  not : 

Old  fashions  please  me  best ;  I  am  not  so  nice, 
To  change  true  rules  for  old  inventions. 

But  the  finesse  of  intrigue  in  the  secondary  plot  goes  far  beyond 
this.     Lucentio  has  come  to   Padua  with  a  certain  amount  of 
state ;  he  has  servants,  and  a  family  name  to  support.     One  of 
his  servants  is  Tranio,  in  whom  we  recognise  a  modernisation 
of  a  type  familiar  to  Roman  Comedy,  the  scheming  slave  or 
professional  sharper.     When,  therefore,  Lucentio   assumes  his 
disguise,  he   makes  this  Tranio  take  his  master's   name    and 
position ;  more  than  this,  the  pseudo-Lucentio  is  to  go  in  state  to 
Baptista's  house,  and  be  in  name  one  more  suitor  for  the  hand 
of  Bianca ;  he  will  thus  be  always  at  hand  to  second  his  master's  I 
secret   play.^     Tranio  acts   the  gentleman   to  perfection,  and  I 
makes  a  social  impression  for  the  name  of  'Lucentio.'^    Thus   i 
the  real  Lucentio  carries  on  a  double  campaign,  wooing  the  lady  / 
in  his  own  (disguised)  person,  and  through  his  servant  heading 
off  his   rivals.     Two   more  strokes   of    irony   are   due   to  the 
machinations  of  Tranio,  soi-disant  Lucentio.     When  one  of  the 
rivals,  Hortensio,  is  getting  discouraged  —  since  the  teacher  of 
poetry  steadily  gains  upon  the  teacher  of  music  —  the  supposed 

1 1,  i,  from  203.  2  II.  i^  from  87 ;  I.  ii,  from  219. 


2l8 


THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 


r^ 


Lucentio  with  easy  magnanimity  moves  Hortensio  to   mutual 
renunciation  of  their  claims.^ 

Hortensio.  Quick  proceeders,  marry !  Now,  tell  me,  I  pray, 
You  that  durst  swear  that  your  miiUress  Bianca 
Loved  none  in  the  world  so  well  as  Lucentio. 

Tranio.        O  despiteful  love!  unconstant  womankind! 
I  tell  thee,  Licio,  this  is  wonderful, 

Hortensio.   Mistake  no  more :  I  am  not  Licio, 
Nor  a  musician,  as  I  seem  to  be ; 
But  one  that  scorn  to  live  in  this  disguise.  .  .  . 
Know,  sir,  that  I  am  call'd  Hortensio. 

Tranio.         Signior  Hortensio,  I  have  often  heard 
Of  your  entire  affection  to  Bianca ; 
And  since  mine  eyes  are  witness  of  her  lightness, 
I  will  with  you,  if  you  be  so  contented, 
Forswear  Bianca  and  her  love  for  ever. 

Hortensio.   See,  how  they  kiss  and  court !    Signior  Lucentio, 
Here  is  my  hand,  and  here  I  firmly  vow 
Never  to  woo  her  more,  but  do  forswear  her, 
As  one  unworthy  all  the  fonner  favours 
That  I  have  fondly  flatter'd  her  withal. 

Tranio.        And  here  I  take  the  like  unfeigned  oath. 

Never  to  marry  with  her  though  she  would  entreat. 


\ 


Not  less  ironical  is  the  situation  when  the  assumed  Lucentio 
makes  his  play  against  the  other  rival.^  Gremio  has  no  attrac- 
tions of  youth ;  his  time  comes  when  the  question  is  of  settle- 
ments. But  even  Gremio's  wealth  is  made  to  look  small  by  one 
who  can  draw  upon  the  bank  of  imagination. 

Baptista.     Say,  Signior  Gremio,  what  can  you  assure  her? 
Gremio.        First,  as  you  know,  my  house  within  the  city 

Is  richly  furnished  with  plate  and  gold  ; 

Basins  and  ewers  to  lave  her  dainty  hands ; 

My  hangings  all  of  Tyrian  tapestry ; 

In  ivory  coffers  I  have  stuff 'd  my  crowns ; 


llV.ii. 


ail.  i,  from 343. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND  IRONY 


219 


In  cypress  chests  my  arras  counterpoints, 

Costly  apparel,  tents,  and  canopies, 
Fine  linen,  Turkey  cushions  bossM  with  pearl, 
Valance  of  Venice  gold  in  needlework. 
Pewter  and  brass  and  all  things  that  belong 
To  house  or  housekeeping :  then,  at  my  farm 
I  have  a  hundred  milch-kine  to  the  pail, 
Sixscore  fat  oxen  standing  in  my  stalls, 
And  all  things  answerable  to  this  portion. 
Myself  am  struck  in  years,  I  must  confess  ; 
And  if  I  die  to-morrow,  this  is  hers, 
If  whilst  I  live  she  will  be  only  mine. 

Tranio.    That  '  only '  came  well  in.     Sir,  list  to  me  : 
I  am  my  father's  heir  and  only  son : 
If  I  may  have  your  daughter  to  my  wife, 
I'll  leave  her  houses  three  or  four  as  good. 
Within  rich  Pisa  walls,  as  any  one 
Old  Signior  Gremio  has  in  Padua ; 
Besides  two  thousand  ducats  by  the  year 
Of  fruitful  land,  all  which  shall  be  her  jointure. 
What,  have  I  pinch'd  you,  Signior  Gremio? 

Gremio.    Two  thousand  ducats  by  the  year  of  land! 
My  land  amounts  not  to  so  much  in  all ; 
That  she  shall  have  ;  besides  an  argosy 
That  now  is  lying  in  Marseilles'  road. 
What,  have  I  choked  you  with  an  argosy? 

Tranio.    Gremio,  'tis  known  my  father  hath  no  less 

Than  three  great  argosies  ;  besides  two  galliases, 
And  twelve  tight  galleys :  these  I  will  assure  her. 
And  twice  as  much,  whate'er  thou  offer'st  next. 

Gremio.    Nay,  I  have  offered  all,  I  have  no  more ; 

And  she  can  have  no  more  than  all  I  have. 


Four  fine  situations  of  irony  have  thus  sprung  from  the  clash 
of  intrigues  in  the  secondary  plot.  A  fifth  is  added  as  at  last 
the  secondary  plot  is  made  to  clash  with  the  primary.  Tranio, 
playing  the  role  of  his  master,  has  had  it  all  his  own  way  so  far  ; 
but  he  is  now,  naturally  enough,  called  upon  to  make  good  his 


220  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

promises  by  a  pledge  from  Lucentio's  father.^  Without  a  blush 
he  undertakes  this. 

'Tis  in  my  head  to  do  my  master  good ; 

I  see  no  reason,  but  supposed  Lucentio 

Must  get  a  father,  calPd  '  supposed  Vincentio ' ; 

And  that's  a  wonder :  fathers  commonly 

Do  get  their  children ;  but  in  this  case  of  wooing, 

A  child  shall  get  a  sire,  if  I  fail  not  of  my  cunning. 

The  plan  is  a  simple  one :  the  strangers  entering  the  city  are 
scanned,  until  a  suitable  figure  is  found  in  a  certain  Pedant.^ 

Tranio.     What  countryman,  I  pray  ? 

Pedant,  Of  Mantua. 

Tranio.     Of  Mantua,  sir?   marry,  God  forbid! 

And  come  to  Padua,  careless  of  your  life  ? 

Pedant.    My  life,  sir !  how,  I  pray  ?  for  that  goes  hard. 

Tranio.    'Tis  death  for  any  one  in  Mantua 

To  come  to  Padua.     Know  you  not  the  cause? 
Your  ships  are  stay'd  at  Venice,  and  the  duke. 
For  private  quarrel  'twixt  your  duke  and  him, 
Hath  published  and  proclaimed  it  openly : 
'Tis  marvel,  but  that  you  are  but  newly  come, 
You  might  have  heard  it  else  proclaim'd  about. 

Pedant.    Alas,  sir,  it  is  worse  for  me  than  so! 

For  I  have  bills  for  money  by  exchange 
From  Florence  and  must  here  deliver  them. 

Tranio  obligingly  proposes  that  the  stranger  shall  assume  the 
personality  of  one  Sir  Vincentio  of  Pisa,  shortly  expected  to 
arrange  a  matter  of  dowry  for  his  son  on  his  marriage  to  Signior 
Baptista's  daughter;  the  Pedant  is  only  too  glad  to  save  his 
life  on  these  easy  terms.  So  far  the  intrigue  of  Tranio  is 
triumphant;  but  meanwhile  the  train  of  events  which  makes 
the  primary  plot  of  the  play  is  preparing  for  it  a  collision. 
Petruchio  and  his  Katherine  journeying  to  Padua  fall  in  by  the 

1 II.  i,  from  389.  3  IV.  ii,  from  59. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  221 

way  with  a  reverend  senior  travelling  in  the  same  direction ;  ^ 
when  the  name  of  Vincentio  of  Pisa  is  mentioned,  Petruchio 
hails  him  as  a  prospective  marriage  connection,  and  escorts  him 
to  the  house  where  his  son  will  be  found  to  have  made  a  wealthy 
and  influential  match.  As  they  knock  at  the  door  ^  the  real  and 
the  assumed  Vincentio  clash. 

Pedant  {looking  out  at  the  window).  What's  he  that 
knocks  as  he  would  beat  down  the  gate? 

Vincentio.    Is  Signior  Lucentio  within,  sir? 

Pedant.    He's  within,  sir,  but  not  to  be  spoken  withal. 

Vincentio.  What  if  a  man  bring  him  a  hundred  pound  or 
two,  to  make  merry  withal. 

Pedant.  Keep  your  hundred  pounds  to  yourself:  he  shall 
need  none,  so  long  as  I  live. 

Petruchio.  Nay,  I  told  you  your  son  was  well  beloved  in 
Padua.  Do  you  hear,  sir?  To  leave  frivolous  circumstances, 
I  pray  you,  tell  Signior  Lucentio,  that  his  father  is  come  from 
Pisa,  and  is  here  at  the  door  to  speak  with  him. 

Pedant.  Thou  liest :  his  father  is  come  from  Padua,  and 
here  looking  out  at  the  window. 

Vincentio.   Art  thou  his  father? 

Pedant.    Ay,  sir ;  so  his  mother  says,  if  I  may  believe  her. 

Petruchio  {to  Vincentio).  Why,  how  now,  gentleman  !  why, 
this  is  flat  knavery,  to  take  upon  you  another  man's  name. 

Pedant.  Lay  hands  on  the  villain :  I  believe  a'  means  to 
cozen  somebody  in  this  city  under  my  countenance. 

The  ironical  situation  is  prolonged  as  Lucentio's  servants  come 
on  the  scene,  and  hasten  to  take  part  against  their  master's  own 
father ;  stormy  passages  ensue,  until  Lucentio  comes  in  person,  but 
comes  with  his  bride  on  his  arm  fi-esh  from  the  church.  There  is 
explanation  and  confession  :  but  the  essential  of  the  marriage  has 
been  secured,  and  the  irate  father  can  only  make  the  best  of  the 
circumstances  :  irony  gives  place  to  the  usual  happy  ending. 
For  Shakespeare's   treatment  of  intrigue  and  irony  it  seems 

IIV.  V,  from26.  ay.i. 


222  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

natural  to  mention  first  this  play  of  The  Taming  of  the  Shrew ; 
no  other  drama  is  richer  in  ironic  situations,  while  the  personal 
will,  of  which  intrigue  is  the  embodiment,  seems  to  find  its  climax 
in  a  sustained  paradox.  Hardly  less  remarkable  is  The  Two 
Gentlemen  of  Verona :  here  the  successive  advances  in  intrigue 
and  irony  seem  to  be  made  with  all  the  regularity  of  a  game  of 
chess.^ 

The  opening  situation  is  complex,  yet  without  conflict.  We 
have  three  independent  interests  to  keep  before  our  minds :  there 
is  the  romantic  friendship  between  Proteus  and  Valentine,  the  two 
gentlemen  of  Verona ;  there  is  the  love  of  one  of  them,  Proteus,  for 
JuHa ;  again,  over  in  Milan,  there  is  what,  to  distinguish  it  from 
love,  we  may  call  a  piece  of  social  matchmaking  —  the  suit  of 
Sir  Thurio  for  the  hand  of  Silvia,  the  Duke's  daughter,  favoured  by 
her  father,  resisted  by  herself.  The  movement  of  the  play  com- 
mences with  Valentine  setting  off  on  his  travels ;  he  comes  to 
Milan,  and  entertains  for  Silvia  a  passion  which  is  fully  recipro- 
cated. This  love  of  Valentine  and  Silvia  becomes  an  intrigue, 
since  it  must  be  kept  from  the  knowledge  of  the  father  and  the 
accepted  suitor.  The  irony  latent  in  such  a  situation  becomes 
apparent  in  a  later  scene,^  at  a  time  when  Valentine's  secret  has 
been  betrayed  to  the  Duke.  The  lover,  conscious  to  himself  of 
a  rope-ladder  under  his  cloak  with  which  he  is  to  scale  Silvia's 
window,  is  detained  by  the  Duke  with  a  long  confidential  ex- 
planation of  his  purpose  —  from  disgust  with  his  daughter's 
perverseness  —  to  marry  again. 

Val.       What  would  your  Grace  have  me  to  do  in  this  ? 
Duke.     There  is  a  lady  in  Verona  here 

Whom  I  affect ;  but  she  is  nice  and  coy 

And  nought  esteems  my  aged  eloquence : 

Now  therefore  would  I  have  thee  to  my  tutor  — 

For  long  agone  I  have  forgot  to  court ; 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  page  341. 

2  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona  III.  i,  from  51. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY 


223 


Besides,  the  fashion  of  the  time  is  changed  — 
How  and  which  way  I  may  bestow  myself 
To  be  regarded  in  her  sun-bright  eye. 

Valentine  gives  the  Duke  good  advice;  but  it  appears  that  the 
lady  is  jealously  kept  all  day  from  the  approach  of  wooers. 

Val.        Why,  then,  I  would  resort  to  her  by  night. 
Duke.     Ay,  but  the  doors  be  lock'd  and  keys  kept  safe. 

That  no  man  hath  recourse  to  her  by  night. 
Val.       What  lets  but  one  may  enter  at  her  window  ? 
Duke.     Her  chamber  is  aloft,  far  from  the  ground. 

And  built  so  shelving  that  one  cannot  climb  it 

Without  apparent  hazard  of  his  life. 
Val.       Why  then,  a  ladder  quaintly  made  of  cords. 

To  cast  up,  with  a  pair  of  anchoring  hooks. 

Would  serve  to  scale  another  Hero's  tower, 

So  bold  Leander  would  adventure  it. 
Duke.     Now,  as  thou  art  a  gentleman  of  blood, 

Advise  me  where  I  may  have  such  a  ladder. 
Val.       When  would  you  use  it  ?  pray,  sir,  tell  me  that. 
Duke.     This  very  night ;  for  Love  is  like  a  child. 

That  longs  for  every  thing  that  he  can  come  by. 
Val.        By  seven  o'clock  I'll  get  you  such  a  ladder. 
Duke.     But,  hark  thee ;  I  will  go  to  her  alone  : 

How  shall  I  best  convey  the  ladder  thither? 
Val.        It  will  be  light,  my  lord,  that  you  may  bear  it 

Under  a  cloak  that  is  of  any  length. 
Dicke.     A  cloak  as  long  as  thine  will  serve  the  turn  ? 
Val.       Ay,  my  good  lord. 
Duke.  Then  let  me  see  thy  cloak : 

I'll  get  me  one  of  such  another  length. 
Val.       Why,  any  cloak  will  serve  the  turn,  my  lord. 
Duke.     How  shall  I  fashion  me  to  wear  a  cloak  ? 

I  pray  thee,  let  me  feel  thy  cloak  upon  me. 

What  letter  is  this  same  ?   What's  here  ?    <■  To  Silvia' ! 

And  here  an  engine  fit  for  my  proceeding. 

Meanwhile  the  action  of  the  play  has  made  a  second  advance 
when  Proteus,  unexpectedly,  has  also  been  sent  by  his  father  to 


224  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

travel.  Proteus  has  arrived  at  Milan,  and  instantly  fallen  in  love 
with  Silvia.  Such  love  makes  a  triple  intrigue  :  it  is  an  intrigue 
in  love,  for  Proteus  is  thus  false  to  his  Julia ;  it  is  an  intrigue  in 
friendship,  Proteus  betraying  his  friend's  secret  to  the  Duke  in 
order  to  get  Valentine  out  of  the  way ;  yet  again,  it  is  an  intrigue 
in  social  life  and  matchmaking,  since  the  only  way  of  getting 
access  to  Silvia  is  for  Proteus  to  pretend  to  woo  on  behalf  of 
Sir  Thurio. 

Proteus.   Already  have  I  been  false  to  Valentine, 
And  now  I  must  be  as  unjust  to  Thurio. 
Under  the  colour  of  commending  him, 
I  have  access  my  own  love  to  prefer : 
But  Silvia  is  too  fair,  too  true,  too  holy. 
To  be  corrupted  with  my  wortHless  gifts. 
When  I  protest  true  loyalty  to  her, 
She  twits  me  with  my  falsehood  to  my  friend ; 
When  to  her  beauty  I  commend  my  vows. 
She  bids  me  think  how  I  have  been  forsworn 
In  breaking  faith  with  Julia  whom  I  loved.  ^ 

The  movement  advances  yet  another  stage:  Julia,  fearing 
herself  forsaken  by  her  absent  lover,  sets  off  to  travel  in  dis- 
guise of  a  boy ;  and  at  last,  in  Milan,  engages  herself  as  page  to 
the  unconscious  Proteus.  What  before  was  triple  intrigue  now 
becomes  triple  irony.  There  is  irony  in  love,  as  JuHa  is  brought 
by  a  friendly  landlord  to  hear  her  lover  serenade  another  mis- 
tress.^ 

Host.  How  now  !  are  you  sadder  than  you  were  before  ? 
How  do  you,  man  ?  the  music  likes  you  not. 

Julia.   You  mistake :  the  musician  likes  me  not. 

Host.   Why,  my  pretty  youth  ? 

Julia.   He  plays  false,  father. 

Host.   How  ?  out  of  tune  on  the  strings  ? 

Julia.  Not  so;  but  yet  so  false  that  he  grieves  my  very 
heart-strings. 

Host.   You  have  a  quick  ear. 

1 IV.  ii.  1.  2  IV.  ii,  from  26. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY 


225 


Julia. 
heart. 
Host. 
Julia. 
Host. 
Julia. 
Host. 
Julia. 


Ay,  I  would  I  were  deaf ;   it  makes  me  have  a  slow 


I  perceive  you  delight  not  in  music. 

Not  a  whit,  when  it  jars  so. 

Hark,  what  fine  change  is  in  the  music! 

Ay,  that  change  is  the  spite. 

You  would  have  them  always  play  but  one  thing  ? 

I  would  always  have  one  play  but  one  thing. 

But  there  is  also  irony  in  friendship  :  by  one  of  Shakespeare's 
happiest  touches,  Proteus  sends  the  page  to  Silvia  for  her 
picture ;  as  the  indignant  Silvia  takes  the  part  of  the  unknown 
Julia  the  real  Julia  is  warming  to  her,  and  thus  a  secretly  davi^n- 
ing  affection  between  their  mistresses  comes  to  supply  the  place 
of  the  secretly  ruptured  friendship  between  the  two  gentlemen 
of  Verona.^ 


Silvia. 

Julia. 

Silvia. 


Julia. 
Silvia. 


Julia. 

Silvia. 

Julia. 

Silvia. 
Julia. 


Silvia. 


O,  he  sends  you  for  a  picture. 

Ay,  madam. 

Ursula,  bring  my  picture  there. 

Go,  give  your  master  this  :  tell  him  from  me, 

One  Julia,  that  his  changing  thoughts  forget. 

Would  better  fit  his  chamber  than  this  shadow  . 

Madam,  he  sends  your  ladyship  this  ring. 

The  more  shame  for  him  that  he  sends  it  me ; 

For  I  have  heard  him  say  a  thousand  times 

His  Julia  gave  it  him  at  his  departure. 

Though  his  false  finger  have  profaned  the  ring, 

Mine  shall  not  do  his  Julia  so  much  wrong. 

She  thanks  you. 

What  say'st  thou? 

I  thank  you,  madam,  that  you  tender  her. 

Poor  gentlewoman !  my  master  wrongs  her  much. 

Dost  thou  know  her? 

Almost  as  well  as  I  do  know  myself  : 

To  think  upon  her  woes  I  do  protest 

That  I  have  wept  a  hundred  several  times. 

Belike  she  thinks  that  Proteus  hath  forsook  her. 


1  IV.  iv,  from  113. 


226 


THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 


Julia.       I  think  she  doth ;  and  that's  her  cause  of  sorrow. 

Silvia.     Is  she  not  passing  fair? 

Julia.       She  hath  been  fairer,  madam,  than  she  is : 

When  she  did  think  my  master  loved  her  well, 

She,  in  my  judgement,  was  as  fair  as  you ; 

But  since  she  did  neglect  her  looking-glass, 

And  threw  her  sun-expelling  mask  away. 

The  air  hath  starved  the  roses  in  her  cheeks, 

And  pinch'd  the  lily-tincture  of  her  face. 

That  now  she  is  become  as  black  as  I. 
Silvia.     How  tall  was  she  ? 
Julia.       About  my  stature  :  for,  at  Pentecost, 

When  all  our  pageants  of  delight  were  play'd, 

Our  youth  got  me  to  play  the  woman's  part. 

And  I  was  trimm'd  in  Madam  Julia's  gown ; 

Which  served  me  as  fit,  by  all  men's  judgements, 

As  if  the  garment  had  been  made  for  me  : 

Therefore  I  know  she  is  about  my  height. 

And  at  that  time  I  made  her  weep  agood. 

For  I  did  play  a  lamentable  part : 

Madam,  'twas  Ariadne  passioning 

For  Theseus'  perjury  and  unjust  flight ; 

Which  I  so  lively  acted  with  my  tears 

That  my  poor  mistress,  moved  therewithal, 

Wept  bitterly ;  and  would  I  might  be  dead 

If  I  in  thought  felt  not  her  very  sorrow! 
Silvia.     She  is  beholding  to  thee,  gentle  youth. 

Alas,  poor  lady,  desolate  and  leftl 

I  weep  myself  to  think  upon  thy  words. 

Here,  youth,  there  is  my  purse :  I  give  thee  this 

For  thy  sweet  mistress'  sake,  because  thou  lovest  her. 

Farewell.     \_Exit. 
Julia.      And  she  shall  thank  you  iox\  if  e'er  you  know  her. 

To  such  irony  in  love  and  friendship  is  added,  for  completeness, 
irony  in  the  matter  of  the  matchmaker's  intrigue,  when  Proteus 
reports  progress  to  Sir  Thurio,  for  whom  he  is  supposed  to  be 
wooing,  and  the  asides  of  the  page  accentuate  the  ironic  situation.^ 

1  V.  ii. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND  IRONY  227 

Thurio.  Sir  Proteus,  what  says  Silvia  to  my  suit? 

Proteus.  O,  sir,  I  find  her  milder  than  she  was ; 

And  yet  she  takes  exceptions  at  your  person. 

Thurio.  What,  that  my  leg  is  too  long  ? 

Proteus.  No ;  that  it  is  too  little. 

Thurio.  I'll  wear  a  boot,  to  make  it  somewhat  rounder. 

Julia.  (Aside)  But  love  will  not  be  spurr'd  to  what  it  loathes. 

Thurio.  What  says  she  to  my  face  ? 

Proteus.  She  says  it  is  a  fair  one. 

Thurio.  Nay  then,  the  wanton  lies ;  my  face  is  black. 

Proteus.  But  pearls  are  fair ;  and  the  old  saying  is. 

Black  men  are  pearls  in  beauteous  ladies'  eyes. 

Julia.  (Aside)  'Tis  true ;  such  pearls  as  put  out  ladies'  eyes ; 

For  I  had  rather  wink  than  look  on  them. 

Thurio.  How  likes  she  my  discourse? 

Proteus.  Ill,  when  you  talk  of  war. 

Thurio.  But  well,  when  I  discourse  of  love  and  peace? 

Julia.  (Aside)  But  better,  indeed,  when  you  hold  your  peace. 

Thurio.  What  says  she  to  my  valour  ? 

Proteus.  O,  sir,  she  makes  no  doubt  of  that. 

Julia.  (Aside)  She  needs  not,  when  she  knows  it  cowardice. 

Thurio.  What  says  she  to  my  birth  ? 

Proteus.  That  you  are  well  derived. 

J7ilia.  (Aside)  True ;  from  a  gentleman  to  a  fool. 

Already  M^e  have  a  triple  intrigue  with  its  triple  irony ;  it  only 
needs  that  a  further  advance  of  the  movement  shall  bring  the 
threads  of  the  plot  to  a  common  meeting  point.  This  is  secured 
by  the  agency  of  a  band  of  Outlaws  infesting  Italian  roads ;  ^  first 
Valentine,  going  into  banishment,  is  captured  by  them  and  be- 
comes their  captain ;  then  all  the  other  personages  of  the  plot 
in  succession  fall  into  the  hands  of  the  Outlaws  and  the  power 
of  Valentine.  The  prolonged  irony  of  the  plot  thus  intensifies 
to  such  shocks  of  clashing  as  will  rapidly  produce  new  com- 
binations. First,  we  have  Proteus  forcing  his  love  upon  the 
indignant  Silvia  in  the  hearing  of  Valentine  himself  :  the  injured 

1 IV.  i ;  compare  V.  iii,  iv. 


228  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAJCESPEARE 

friend  discovers  himself,  and  Proteus 's  guilty  intrigue  is  shat- 
tered at  a  blow.  But  in  the  rebound  from  this  we  have  another 
shock :  in  his  fulness  of  forgiveness  Valentine  speaks  of  bestow- 
ing his  Silvia  on  Proteus,  when  a  cry  from  the  swooning  page 
discovers  Julia.  The  captured  Duke  and  Thurio  cease  to  pre- 
sent further  obstacles.  All  dissolves  into  a  final  situation  of 
equilibrium,  triple  like  the  opening  situation,  but  with  a  happy 
change  of  persons:  we  end  with  the  restored  friendship  of 
Valentine  and  Proteus,  the  restored  love  of  Proteus  and  Julia, 
and  the  new  love  of  Valentine  and  Silvia  triumphant  over  all 
the  crosses  of  fortune. 

The  two  plays  of  The  Merry  Wives  of  Windsor  and  Twelfth 
Night  have  been  mentioned  in  a  previous  chapter  as  examples 
of  plot  resting  mainly  upon  the  clash  of  intrigues.  Such  plays 
naturally  will  be  full  of  irony.  Two  illustrations  are  especially 
striking.  The  jealous  Ford,  warned  of  Falstaff 's  designs  against 
his  wife,  forms  a  deep  intrigue  of  his  own  :  in  disguise  he  seeks 
the  knight,  and  makes  a  pretext  for  urging  him  on  in  his  wicked 
purpose ;  Ford's  idea,  of  course,  being  to  keep  in  touch  with 
Falstaff's  intrigue  until  he  can  choose  his  own  moment  for  ex- 
posing it.  But  to  the  dramatic  spectator  the  irony  is  exquisite  : 
a  gallant  forming  a  design  against  a  wife  is  being  paid  money  by 
the  husband  for  acting  upon  it;  again.  Ford,  laying  a  deep 
scheme  for  finding  out  whether  his  wife  may  not  be  in  some 
slight  degree  assailable,  is  forced  under  his  disguise  to  listen 
patiently  to  a  circumstantial  account  of  how  this  wife  has  been 
already  assailed,  and  further  to  know  that  he  himself  was 
present  on  the  occasion  and  blindly  let  the  assailant  escape. 
From  Twelfth  Night  comes  the  prettiest  of  all  ironic  situations. 
The  disguised  Viola  loves  the  Duke,  and  naturally  would  throw 
obstacles  in  the  way  of  the  love  embassies  to  Olivia.  So  the 
supposed  page  reads  lectures  to  his  master  on  love. 

Viola.    Say  that  some  lady,  as  perhaps  there  is, 

Hath  for  your  love  as  great  a  pang  of  heart 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  229 

As  you  have  for  Olivia :  you  cannot  love  her ; 
You  tell  her  so ;  must  she  not  then  be  answered  ? 

The  Duke  with  much  rhetoric  protests  that  no  woman's  heart 
is  big  enough  to  hold  love  like  his  own. 

Viola.  Ay,  but  I  know,  — 

Duke.     What  dost  thou  know  ? 

Viola.    Too  well  what  love  women  to  men  may  owe  : 

In  faith,  they  are  as  true  of  heart  as  we. 

My  father  had  a  daughter  loved  a  man. 

As  it  might  be,  perhaps,  were  I  a  woman, 

I  should  your  lordship. 
Duke.  And  what's  her  history? 

Viola.    A  blank,  my  lord.     She  never  told  her  love, 

But  let  concealment,  like  a  worm  i'  the  bud. 

Feed  on  her  damask  cheek :  she  pined  in  thought ; 

And  with  a  green  and  yellow  melancholy 

She  sat  like  patience  on  a  monument. 

Smiling  at  grief.     Was  not  this  love  indeed?  .  .  . 
Duke.     But  died  thy  sister  of  her  love,  my  boy? 
Viola.     I  am  all  the  daughters  of  my  father's  house. 

And  all  the  brothers,  too :  and  yet,  I  know  not. 

A  Midsummer-Night  V  Dream  ^  goes  beyond  even  Twelfth  Night 
in  intricacy  of  ironic  situations.  It  well  may;  for  in  the  Midsum- 
mer-Nighfs  Dream  supernatural  machinery  is  available,  and 
fairy  enchantment  goes  to  swell  the  natural  crossing  of  cir- 
cumstance. We  hear  how  Cupid's  fiery  shaft,  aimed  in  vain 
at  a  maiden  queen,  fell  upon  a  little  western  flower  which  is 
called  love-in-idleness :  ^ 

The  juice  of  it  on  sleeping  eye-lids  laid 
Will  make  or  man  or  woman  madly  dote 
Upon  the  next  live  creature  that  it  sees. 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  page  342. 
*  Midsummer-Night's  Dream  II.  i.  155-187. 


230  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

But  for  this  sweet  poison  there  is  an  antidote  :  Dian's  bud 
prevails  over  Cupid's  flower,  if  it  be  crushed  into  the  eye  of  the 
deluded  lover  :  ^ 

Whose  liquor  hath  this  virtuous  property, 
To  take  from  thence  all  error  with  his  rnight, 
And  make  his  eyeballs  roll  with  wonted  sight. 

With  motive  agencies  of  this  kind  to  draw  upon,  we  are  pre- 
pared for  a  plot  that  will  exhibit  an  ever  increasing  crescendo 
of  entanglement. 

The  original  situation  —  lying  outside  the  play  —  was  simple  : 
two  pairs  of  mutual  loves,  Lysander  and  Hermia,  Demetrius 
and  Helena.  When  the  parties  first  appear  before  us  in  the 
play,^  some  unknown  accident  or  personal  whim  has  produced  a 
situation  of  perversity ;  for  Demetrius  has  transferred  his  love 
to  Hermia,  two  men  loving  the  same  woman,  while  Helena  is 
forsaken,  yet  still  loves.  This  situation  is  converted  into  a 
triple  intrigue  by  the  circumstance  that  Hermia's  father  favours 


the  suit  of  Demetrius,  and  invokes  the  authority  of  the  Duke. 
Accordingly  we  have,  first,  the  lovers  Lysander  and  Hermia 
stealing  away  by  night  out  of  Athens ;  then  Helena,  admitted 
to  their  confidence,  betraying  their  flight  to  Demetrius ;  ^  then 
again,  as  Demetrius  pursues  the  lovers,  Helena  herself  pursuing 
Demetrius.*  In  this  entanglement  of  perverse  intrigue  all  enter 
the   enchanted   wood.     Now  the   King  of   Fairies   interferes: 

MIL  ii.  366;  IV.  i.  78.  8  r.  1.346. 

2  I.  i,  from  21.  *  IL  ii,  from  84. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY 


231 


hearing  the  lamentations  of  Helena  and  the  scorn  of  Demetrius, 
he  sends  Puck  to  exercise  the  virtue  of  Cupid's  flower  upon 
*  an  Athenian '  whom  he  will  find  in  the  wood ;  Puck  mistakes 


his  man,  and  anoints  the  eyes  of  Lysander,  who,  when  he 
awakes,  is  enchanted  into  adoration  of  Helena.^  We  have  thus 
—  not,  as  in  Twelfth  Nighty  a  triangular  duel  of  fancy — but 
what  may  be  called  a  quadrangular  duel  of  perverse  affection  : 
Lysander  in  love  with  Helena,  Helena  with  Demetrius,  Deme- 
trius with  Hermia,  Hermia  with  Lysander.  The  mistake  being 
discovered,  Oberon  himself  takes  charge  of  the  remedy:^  he 
applies  the  juice  to  Demetrius 's  eyes,  while  Puck  is  sent  to 
bring  Helena  to  the  side  of  Demetrius  when  he  shall  awake. 
The  charm  takes  effect,  but  the  complication  is  greater  than 
ever:  once  more  we  have  two  men  wooing  one  woman,  with 


HELENA 


DEMETRIUS 


another  woman  forsaken ;  but  Helena,  the  doubly-wooed,  takes 
it  all  for  mockery  of  her  forsaken  condition  ;  at  last  she  turns 
upon  Hermia,  and  squabbles  between  the  girls  are  added  to 
crossings  of  the  lovers.  ^ 


1 II.  ii.  70,  103.  2  in,  ii^  from  88. 

8  From  III.  ii.  192  to  447  this  acutest  phase  of  the  entanglement  prevails: 
dotted  lines  in  the  figure  suggest  the  breaking  up  of  amicable  relations  between 
the  two  girls,  and  again  between  the  two  men. 


232  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Helena.      Lo,  she  is  one  of  this  confederacy ! 

Now  I  perceive  they  have  conjoin'd  all  three 

To  fashion  this  false  sport,  in  spite  of  me. 

Injurious  Hermia !  most  ungrateful  maid ! 

Have  you  conspired,  have  you  with  these  contrived 

To  bait  me  with  this  foul  derision  ? 

Is  all  the  counsel  that  we  two  have  shared, 

The  sisters'  vows,  the  hours  that  we  have  spent, 

When  we  have  chid  the  hasty-footed  time 

For  parting  us,  —  O,  is  it  all  forgot  ? 

All  school-days'  friendship,  childhood  innocence  ? 

This  is  only  the  mild  beginning:  in  time  they  come  near  to 
personal  violence. 

Helena.      I  pray  you,  though  you  mock  me,  gentlemen, 
Let  her  not  hurt  me  :  I  was  never  curst ;  .  .  • 
O,  when  she's  angry,  she  is  keen  and  shrewd! 
She  was  a  vixen  when  she  went  to  school ; 
And  though  she  be  but  little,  she  is  fierce. 

Hermia.     '  Little  '  again !  nothing  but '  low  '  and  kittle  '! 
Why  will  you  suffer  her  to  flout  me  thus  ? 
Let  me  come  to  her. 

Meanwhile  the  combative  spirit  has  spread  to  the  men  : 

Demetrius.  If  she  cannot  entreat,  I  can  compel. 

Lysander.  Thou  can'st  compel  no  more  than  she  entreat.  .  .  . 

Defnetrius.  I  say  I  love  thee  more  than  he  can  do. 

Lysander.  If  thou  say  so,  withdraw,  and  prove  it  too. 

At  last  we  have  the  vixenish  Hermia  chasing  the  longer-legged 
Helena,  the  two  lovers  with  drawn  swords  chasing  one  another 
through  the  dusky  wood  ;  Puck,  with  mist  and  mimicking  voice, 
rejoicing  to  emphasise  the  confusion.  When  all  lie  down  from 
sheer  weariness,  unconscious  of  the  vicinity  of  the  others,  the 
time  has  come  for  applying  the  antidote.  It  only  needs  to 
squeeze  Dian's  bud  into  the  eyes  of  Lysander,^  and  the  whole 

MIL  ii.4SO. 


DRAMATIC   INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  233 

tangle  of  ironic  perversity  resolves  into  the  final  happy  situa- 
tion :  two  pairs  of  loyal  lovers,  the  sundered  friendship  of 
the  schoolmates  and  the  sundered  good-fellowship  of  the 
young  men  entirely  restored.     As  the  four  awake  and  leave  the 


enchanted  wood,  they  can  hardly  persuade  themselves  that 
the  distracting  events  of  the  night  have  been  anything  more 
than  a  midsummer-night's  dream.^ 

Two  more  of  Shakespeare's  comedies  are  noteworthy  for  the 
treatment  of  intrigue  and  irony.  The  main  plot  of  Much  Ado 
About  Nothing"^  rests  upon  an  intrigue  of  the  blackest  villany. 
Don  John,  rebel  against  his  brother  the  Prince,  has  been  con- 
quered, and  brought  home  in  sullen  subjection  :  he  is  on  the 
watch  for  mischief.  He  and  his  followers  concert  a  deep 
scheme  against  a  favourite  of  the  Prince :  it  is  that  some  one 
should  personate  Hero,  and  exhibit  her  in  an  equivocal  situation 
before  the  Prince  and  his  friend,  the  very  night  before  she  is  to 
become  this  Cl^udio's  bride.  But  conspiracy  is  for  ever  at  the 
mercy  of  accident ;  irony  and  accident  combine  when  the  dra- 
matic providence  of  the  play  contrives  the  slightest  of  accidents 
as  sufficient  for  the  purpose.  It  is  found  in  the  Night  Watch  — 
stupidest  of  all  Night  Watches,  a  company  of  louts  officered  by 
a  pair  of  asses ;  these  have  not  had  time  to  compose  themselves 
to  sleep  through  their  watch  before  they  happen  to  overhear 
a  conversation  of  Don  John's  men,  and  the  conspiracy  is  be- 
trayed before  it  has  reached  its  completion.     It  is  however  just 

1 IV.  i.  136-196. 

2  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  page  346. 


234  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

here  that  the  strongest  irony  comes  in.  The  officers  of  the 
watch,  Dogberry  and  Verges,  big  with  self-importance,  bring 
their  discovery  to  the  governor,^ 

Leonato.    What  would  you  with  me,  honest  neighbour  ? 

Dogberry.  Marry,  sir,  I  would  have  some  confidence  with 
you  that  decerns  you  nearly. 

Leonato.  Brief,  I  pray  you ;  for  you  see  it  is  a  busy  time 
with  me. 

Dogberry.     Marry,  this  it  is,  sir. 

Verges.     Yes,  in  truth  it  is,  sir. 

Leonato.     What  is  it,  my  good  friends  ? 

Dogberry.  Goodman  Verges,  sir,  speaks  a  little  off  the 
matter :  an  old  man,  sir,  and  his  wits  are  not  so  blunt  as,  God 
help,  I  would  desire  they  were;  but,  in  faith,  honest  as  the 
skin  between  his  brows. 

Verges.  Yes,  I  thank  God  I  am  as  honest  as  any  man 
living  that  is  an  old  man  and  no  honester  than  I. 

Dogberry.  Comparisons  are  odorous :  palabras,  neighbour 
Verges. 

Leonato.     Neighbours,  you  are  tedious. 

Dogberry.  It  pleases  your  worship  to  say  so,  but  we  are 
the  poor  duke's  officers;  but  truly,  for  mine  own  part,  if  I 
were  as  tedious  as  a  king,  I  could  find  it  in  my  heart  to  be- 
stow it  all  of  your  worship. 

leonato.     All  thy  tediousness  on  me,  ah  ? 

Dogberry.  Yea,  an  'twere  a  thousand  pound  more  than 
'tis;  for  I  hear  as  good  exclamation  on  your  worship  as  of 
any  man  in  the  city ;  and  though  I  be  but  a  poor  man,  I  am 
glad  to  hear  it. 

Verges.     And  so  am  I. 

Leonato.     I  would  fain  know  what  you  have  to  say. 

Verges.  Marry,  sir,  our  watch  to-night,  excepting  your 
worship's  presence,  ha'  ta'en  a  couple  of  as  arrant  knaves  as 
any  in  Messina. 

Dogberry.  A  good  old  man,  sir;  he  will  be  talking:  as 
they  say,  when  the  age  is  in,  the  wit  is  out :   God  help  us ! 

1  Much  Ado  III.  V. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  235 

it  is  a  world  to  see.  Well  said,  i'  faith,  neighbour  Verges : 
well,  God's  a  good  man ;  an  two  men  ride  of  a  horse,  one 
must  ride  behind.  An  honest  soul,  i'  faith,  sir ;  by  my  troth 
he  is,  as  ever  broke  bread ;  but  God  is  to  be  worshipped ;  all 
men  are  not  alike  ;  alas,  good  neighbour. 

Leonato.     Indeed,  neighbour,  he  comes  too  short  of  you. 

Dogberry.     Gifts  that  God  gives. 

Leonato.     1  must  leave  you. 

Dogberry.  One  word,  sir :  our  watch,  sir,  have  indeed  com- 
prehended two  aspicious  persons,  and  we  would  have  them 
this  morning  examined  before  your  worship. 

Leonato.  Take  their  examination  yourself  and  bring  it  me : 
I  am  now  in  great  haste,  as  it  may  appear  unto  you. 

The  dramatic  spectator  thus  vi^atches  the  important  discovery  in 
the  act  of  being  revealed,  and  revealed  to  the  father  of  the 
threatened  bride:  but  he  sees,  on  the  other  hand,  the  fussy 
haste  of  Leonato,  with  a  bridal  ceremony  on  his  hands,  and  the 
fussy  self-importance  of  Dogberry  and  Verges,  resolved  to  make 
the  most  of  their  accidental  find,  clash  together,  and  delay  the 
understanding  of  what  has  happened  until  it  is  too  late,  and 
the  unhappy  Hero  has  been  shamed  before  the  whole  congrega- 
tion. The  resolution  of  this  entanglement  is  striking.  Villa- 
nous  intrigue  has  been  met  by  accident ;  has  been  reinstated  by 
perverse  folly  :  it  is  now  met  by  what  may  be  called  the  pious 
intrigue  of  the  Friar.  His  sagacity  has  suspected  some  con- 
cealed wrong :  he  throws  over  Hero  the  veil  of  a  reputed  death, 
until  bridegroom  and  Prince  and  father  have  learned  the  truth 
and  been  stricken  with  remorse.  Claudio  penitentially  under- 
takes the  strange  recompense  to  the  family  honour,  that  he 
shall  wed  a  veiled  and  unknown  bride ;  the  raised  veil  dis- 
plays Hero  risen  from  the  death  of  her  slandered  fame,  and 
all  ends  happily. 

As  the  main  plot  of  this  play  is  interesting  for  its  peculiar 
handling  of  intrigue  and  irony,  so  the  underplot  is  a  masterpiece 
of  what  we  have  already  seen  in  another  play  —  the  paradoxical 
intrigue.     Benedict  and   Beatrice  have   become   types  for  the 


236  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

whole  literary  world  of  the  commonest  of  social  conventionalities, 
what  Shakespeare  calls  "  the  merry  war  of  the  sexes."  The 
underplot  is  an  ingenious  conspiracy  of  the  other  personages  of 
the  story  to  bring  the  man-quizzer  and  the  woman-quizzer  into 
love  with  one  another.  The  vein  of  paradox  is  richly  worked, 
and  concludes  in  a  paradoxical  consummation. 

Benedick.  A  miracle  !  here's  our  own  hands  against  our 
hearts.  Come,  I  will  have  thee ;  but,  by  this  light,  I  take  thee 
for  pity. 

Beatrice.  I  would  not  deny  you ;  but,  by  this  good  day,  I 
yield  upon  great  persuasion ;  and  partly  to  save  your  life,  for 
I  was  told  you  were  in  a  consumption. 

The  other  play  to  which  I  have  made  reference  is  the  comedy 
of  AlVs  Well  that  Ends  Well.  We  are  not  concerned  with  the 
difficult  question  of  the  play  —  the  exact  characters  of  Helena 
and  Bertram.  It  is  enough  that  the  plot  is  made  by  a  pair  of 
cross  intrigues.^  There  is  the  intrigue  of  Helena  to  win  Ber- 
tram ;  successful  so  far  that  the  King,  grateful  for  his  rescue 
from  illness,  has  used  his  feudal  authority  to  force  unwilling 
Bertram  to  accept  Helena  as  his  wife.  But  though  the  ceremony 
of  marriage  is  compulsory,  its  consummation  depends  upon  Ber- 
tram's will :  his  intrigue  is  to  escape  the  reality  of  the  union  to 
which  he  has  been  obliged  to  give  nominal  assent.  Bertram 
sends  the  obedient  wife  to  his  ancestral  home,  making  a  pretext 
for  a  temporary  separation  which  he  means  shall  be  eternal. 
Helena  at  last  learns  her  husband's  will  in  this  enigmatic 
message  :  ^ 

When  thou  canst  get  the  ring  upon  my  finger  which  never 
shall  come  off,  and  show  me  a  child  begotten  of  thy  body  that 
I  am  father  to,  then  call  me  husband :  but  in  such  a  *  then ' 
I  write  a  'never.' 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  p.  345. 

2  All's  Well  III.  ii,  59. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND   IRONY  237 

This  is  of  course  the  crux  of  the  whole  plot:  the  opposing 
intrigues  have  met  in  a  central  point.  All  that  follows  is  a 
prolonged  irony:  Bertram,  using  deep  finesse  to  point  the 
impossibility  of  union  with  Helena,  is  all  the  while  teaching 
Helena  the  exact  means  of  winning  him.  As  happens  so  often 
with  enforced  marriages,  Bertram  takes  refuge  in  general  dissi- 
pation ;  in  particular,  he  wooes  a  virtuous  maiden  of  Florence. 
Helena  has  disappeared,  as  it  seems  never  to  return;  and  in 
time  is  supposed  to  be  dead.  But  she  has  followed  in  secret  her 
husband's  career,  and  at  last  concerts  her  plot  with  Diana  of 
Florence,  to  take  Diana's  place,  and  turn  an  intended  sin  into  a 
deed  of  restitution. 

Helena.  Why  then  to-night 

Let  us  assay  our  plot ;  which,  if  it  speed, 
Is  wicked  meaning  in  a  lawful  deed 
And  lawful  meaning  in  a  lawful  act, 
Where  both  not  sin,  and  yet  a  sinful  fact.^ 

The  irony  that  tinctures  the  whole  situation  breaks  out  finely  at 
one  point  in  the  dialogue.  The  impassioned  Bertram  is  wooing 
the  Florentine  maiden,  when  she  suddenly  seems  to  yield.^ 

Diana.  Give  me  that  ring. 

Bertram.    I'll  lend  it  thee,  my  dear ;  but  have  no  power 

To  give  it  from  me. 
Diana.  Will  you  not,  my  lord? 

Bertram.    It  is  an  honour  'longing  to  our  house, 

Bequeathed  down  from  many  ancestors  ; 

Which  were  the  greatest  obloquy  i'  the  world 

In  me  to  lose. 
Diana.  Mine  honour's  such  a  ring : 

My  chastity's  the  jewel  of  our  house, 

Bequeathed  down  from  many  ancestors ; 

Which  were  the  greatest  obloquy  i'  the  world 

In  me  to  lose :   thus  your  own  proper  wisdom 

iIII.  vii.  fin.  2IV.  ii.39. 


238  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Brings  in  the  champion  Honour  on  my  part, 
Against  your  vain  assault. 
Bertram.  Here,  take  my  ring : 

My  house,  mine  honour,  yea,  my  life,  be  thine. 
And  ril  be  bid  by  thee. 

The  plot  goes  forward  to  its  completion.  Bertram  awakes  from 
deepest  disgrace  to  find  a  refuge  in  the  restored  Helena ;  he  has 
consummated  a  union  in  the  act  of  deserting  it,  and  by  his  own 
unconscious  deed  fulfilled  the  impossible  condition  his  own 
bitter  wit  had  devised. 

In  this  way  intrigue,  with  its  attendant  irony,  dominates  the 
comedies  of  Shakespeare.  But  intrigue  has  a  place  in  tragedy 
also,  and  here  the  irony  may  be  of  a  different  kind.  The  great 
study  for  this  is  the  play  of  Othello}  As  motive  centre  of  this 
play,  we  have  lago,  whose  soul  is  shaped  by  intrigue  ;  infinitely 
crafty  to  plot,  lago  is  also  infinitely  subtle  to  suspect ;  until  sus- 
picion goes  beyond  all  natural  bounds,  and  —  like  an  eye 
strained  by  gazing  at  strong  colours  —  lago  sees  nothing  but  his 
own  dark  passions  even  in  the  purity  of  Othello  and  Cassio.^ 
The  opening  situation  of  the  drama  is  threefold.  In  Roderigo 
we  have  lust :  the  mere  pursuit  of  a  beauty  which  morally  is  on 
a  plane  out  of  his  reach ;  mere  animal  pursuit,  in  the  spirit  of 
the  poet's  scornful  word  — 

Man  is  the  hunter ;    woman  is  his  game ; 
The  sleek  and  comely  creatures  of  the  chase ; 
We  hunt  them  for  the  beauty  of  their  skins. 

Cassio  is  heart  whole  :  even  in  his  liaison  with  Bianca  —  which 
in  the  spirit  of  the  age  must  be  considered  an  innocent  thing  — 
he  is  tolerant,  not  amorous ;  while  he  has  been  the  trusted  go- 
between  in  arranging  the  marriage  of  Desdemona  with  his  chief. 
The  third  element  in  the  opening  situation  is  the  mutual  love  of 
Othello  and  Desdemona;  the  natural  aflinity  of  soul  which  has 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  p.  363. 

2  Othello.  11.  i.  304,  316. 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND  IRONY  239 

drawn  together  such  opposites  as  the  swarthy  Moor  and  the  deli- 
cate aristocratic  beauty  of  Venice.  Upon  this  threefold  situation 
is  brought  to  bear  the  brooding  suspiciousness  of  lago,  and  we  get 
a  threefold  intrigue.  Against  Roderigo  it  is  the  intrigue  of  the 
sharper  and  his  dupe;  Roderigo  is  baited  with  specious  hopes, 
while  he  turns  his  estate  into  costly  jewels,  which  get  no  farther 
than  the  coffers  of  lago.  As  to  Cassio,  lago  has  a  double  plot : 
he  seeks  to  oust  him  from  an  office  he  desires  for  himself;  yet 
more,  he  seeks  to  get  rid  altogether  of  a  man  the  daily  beauty  in 
whose  life  makes  lago  seem  ugly.^  The  third  intrigue  is  against 
Othello  :  the  soul  of  lago,  sodden  with  jealous  suspicion,  has  con- 
ceived the  impossible  idea  that  Othello  has  wronged  him  with  his 
wife  Emilia  ;^  and  lago  resolves  to  make  Othello  in  his  turn  feel 
what  the  pangs  of  jealousy  mean.  And  here  the  treatment  of 
intrigue  is  different  from  what  we  have  seen  in  the  other  plays. 
Instead  of  these  intrigues  conflicting  with  one  another,  lago,  by  a 
few  simple  devices,  is  able  to  make  them  all  cooperate  in  one 
single  monster  intrigue.  By  the  simple  suggestion  to  Roderigo 
that  Desdemona  is  in  love  with  Cassio  the  two  first  intrigues  be- 
come one  :^  Roderigo,  maddened  at  the  idea,  is  easily  persuaded, 
at  the  risk  of  some  bodily  suffering,  to  provoke  a  quarrel  with 
Cassio  when  on  military  duty,  and  by  the  scandal  that  ensues 
Cassio  loses  his  position ;  at  the  same  time  it  is  by  employing 
Roderigo,  and  giving  him  a  sense  of  doing  something  in  the 
pursuit  of  Desdemona,  that  lago  keeps  his  hold  on  Roderigo's 
purse.  Later  lago  sets  Roderigo  on  to  attacking  Cassio  by  night, 
lago  himself  being  at  hand  to  secure,  as  he  hopes,  the  death  of 
both."*  Again,  by  choosing  the  name  of  Cassio  as  the  name  to 
suggest  to  Othello  in  connection  with  dark  insinuations  against 
the  honour  of  Desdemona,  lago  makes  the  second  and  third 
intrigues  into  one ;  by  a  sort  of  economy  of  villany  it  is  brought 
about  that  all  done  towards  racking  Othello's  heart  with  jealous 

1  V.  i.  19.  8  From  II.  i.  220. 

2  I.  iii,  from  392;  II.  i,  from  295.  *  IV.  ii,  from  173 ;  V.  i. 


240  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

misery  is  so  much  done  towards  bringing  Cassio  into  danger, 
making  him  the  victim  of  one  who  is  as  powerful  to  destroy  as 
he  is  maddened  with  sense  of  injury.  Not  only  have  the  four 
intrigues  become  one,  but  also  the  other  threads  making  up  the 
plot  have  been  interwoven  with  them  :  Roderigo's  mad  pursuit  of 
Desdemona  has  added  impetus  to  the  schemes  of  lago ;  the  force 
that  linked  Desdemona  to  Othello  has  become  a  sundering  force 
when  love  has  corrupted  into  jealousy ;  even  the  affair  of  Cassio 
and  Bianca^  is  by  accident  made  to  lend  a  touch  of  impulse  to  the 
swelling  current  of  suspicion.  Thus  all  the  trains  of  action  move 
to  a  common  culmination  in  a  tragic  chmax.  But  an  unexpected 
part  of  this  tragic  climax  is  the  reaction  of  the  intrigues  upon  the 
intriguer.  It  is  here  that  irony  begins  to  appear ;  and  it  is  a  triple 
irony.  The  dark  plotting  of  lago  is  at  last  betrayed  to  Othello  — 
and  by  whom?  It  is  lago's  wife  Emilia  whose  simplicity  hits 
upon  the  truth  that  none  of  the  rest  have  seen ;  lago,  vainly  seek- 
ing to  stop  the  revelation,  when  it  has  come  out,  in  a  moment's 
frenzy  stabs  his  wife.  Here  is.  .the  first  irony_:  when  first  lago 
conceived  his  groundless  suspicions,  he  vowed  he  would  be 
"evened  with  Othello,  wife  for  wife";^  in  a  sense  very  different 
from  what  he  meant  his  words  have  been  fulfilled;  his  devilish 
machinations  have  led  Othello  to  slay  Desdemona,  and,  in  the 
rebound  of  this  tragedy,  lago  has  come  to  slay  his  own  ^Emilia, 
and  is  thus  "  evened  with  Othello,  wife  for  wife."  The  second 
irony  has  reference  to  Roderigo :  lago  had  contrived  his  death 
to  prevent  his  own  betrayal ;  and  from  the  pocket  of  the  slain 
Roderigo  is  taken  the  paper  which  makes  the  final  link  in  the 
chain  of  evidence  against  lago.^  Yet  again,  lago  had  plotted 
against  Cassio's  office  and  his  Hfe :  Cassio  just  escapes  with  his 
life,  succeeds  Othello  in  the  office  of  governor,  and  his  first  official 
act  is  to  superintend  the  torturing  of  lago.* 

Here  is  the  doublesidedness  of  situation  and  mockery  in  events 


1  III.  iv,  from  168 ;  IV.  i,  from  151.  8  Compare  V.  i.  15,  and  V.  ii.  308. 

211.1.308.  •*  V.  ii.  332-335- 


/! 


DRAMATIC  INTRIGUE  AND  IRONY  24 1 

which  make  irony ;  but  there  is  a  difference  from  what  has  so  far 
appeared.  It  is  not  so  much  the  irony  of  circumstances  as  the 
irony  of  fate.  In  comedy,  the  irony  depended  upon  the  dramatic 
spectator  who  was,  so  to  speak,  in  the  confidence  of  the  story,  and 
held  in  his  hands  the  two  sides  of  the  situation  of  which  actors  in 
the  story  saw  only  one  side.  But  in  this  play,  the  suggestion  is 
as  if  fate  —  or  providence,  or  the  general  course  of  events  —  was 
itself  the  spectator,  holding  the  clue  to  the  issue,  which  it  made 
known  in  a  shock  of  irony  only  when  the  issue  was  visibly  de- 
termined. And  such  irony  as  this  has  a  great  part  in  securing  the 
dramatic  satisfaction  with  which  such  a  tragedy  closes.  If  we 
look  merely  at  the  bare  events,  we  find  all  parties  evened  in  a 
common  ruin;  the  innocent  Desdemona  and  the  nobly  erring 
Othello  are  just  as  certainly  overthrown  as  the  stupid  Roderigo 
and  lago  the  arch-villain.  But,  for  a  difference,  a  halo  of  pathos 
surrounds  the  fallen  Othello  and  Desdemona;  not  entirely  free 
from  error,  they  have  nevertheless  perished  because  they  are  too 
nobly  trustful  for  the  evil  surroundings  in  which  they  are  placed. 
But  in  the  fall  of  Roderigo  and  lago  —  in  the  spectacle  of  lust 
slain  by  craft,  craft  overwhelmed  in  the  ruins  of  its  own  crafti- 
ness—  there  is  no  redeeming  pathos,  but  only  the  bitterness  of 
mocking  nemesis;  they  have  lived  the  life  of  villains,  and  the 
irony  of  fate  has  at  last  shown  them  up  for  fools. 


XII 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  AND  THE  SWAY  OF 
CIRCUMSTANCE 

^  Personal  will,  we  have  seen  in  the  preceding  chapter,  is  the 
most  obvious  of  the  forces  moving  the  moral  world ;  and  it  has 
its  dramatic  representation  in  intrigue  and  irony.  Our  next 
question  is  of  other  forces  that  tend  to  limit  individual  will. 
Two  expressions  rise  naturally  to  the  tongue  as  expressing  the 
modification  of  individual  action  —  heredity  and  environment. 

y^  We  have  to  consider  the  relation  of  these  to  the  moral  system 
of  Shakespeare. 

^  The  force  of  heredity  does  not  seem  to  be  prominent  in 
Shakespeare's  world :  we  should  rather  say  that  it  is  conspicu- 
ous by  its  absence.  Perhaps  the  strongest  form  of  heredity  is 
racial  influence,  and  a  chapter  of  this  work^  has  been  devoted 
to  certain  racial  characteristics  of  Roman  life ;  yet,  as  succes- 
sive periods  of  Roman  history  were  portrayed  in  the  three  plays, 
we  saw  the  specially  Roman  view  of  life  yielding  steadily  before 
the  growing  freedom  of  individuality,  racial  heredity  becoming 
diluted  by  advancing  cosmopolitanism.  Again,  we  know  both 
-/  the  parents  of  Hamlet,  and  the  divided  character  of  the  hero 
might  suggest  that  the  strength  inherited  from  his  father  was 
modified  by  weakness  derived  from  his  mother.  Yet  the  same 
play  gives  us  the  two  brothers,  as  unlike  "  as  Hyperion  to  a 
satyr,"  with  nothing  in  the  way  of  ancestry  to  account  for  the 

^  difference.  Similarly,  nothing  is  suggested  to  explain  why  Henry 
of  Monmouth  should  be  so  diverse  from  his  brothers ;  or  why 

1  Chapter  VI. 
242 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  243 

such  a  father  as  Bolingbroke  should  have  such  a  son  as  Henry ; 
or  why  such  a  son  as  Hotspur  should  come  from  such  parents 
as  the  hesitating  Northumberland  and  his  unwarlike  wife.  Dif- 
ference of  maternity,  of  course,  would  account  for  the  differences 
between  Edgar  and  Edmund  in  King  Lear,  or  between  the  prince 
and  Don  John  in  Much  Ado,  or  between  Faulconbridge  and  the 
rightful  heir  in  King  John.  But  this  is  not  suggested  to  explain 
why  Lear  should  have  daughters  so  different,  nor  why  there 
should  be  such  opposite  characters  in  the  family  of  Sir  Rowland 
de  Boys.  It  seems  strange  that  Cymbeline  should  be  the  father 
of  such  a  daughter  as  Imogen,  and  such  sons  as  the  two  stolen 
boys ;  in  the  same  play  the  very  courtiers  remark  upon  the  dif- 
ficulty of  heredity  in  such  a  case  as  the  Queen  and  Cloten  — 

—  that  such  a  crafty  devil  as  is  his  mother 
Should  yield  the  world  this  ass ! 

In  saying  this  I  do  not  mean  to  suggest  that  Shakespeare  is  in 
any  way  untrue  to  life  ;  in  the  world  of  the  actual  it  is  clear  that 
heredity  serves  as  a  very  uncertain  criterion  for  the  analysis  of 
individuality.  Where  the  question  is  of  pigeons,  or  even  of  race 
horses,  the  qualities  in  consideration  are  so  comparatively  simple 
that  careful  breeding  may  produce  very  definite  results.  In 
human  nature  the  force  of  heredity  is  displayed  chiefly  in  the 
lower  stages  of  civilisation ;  as  we  rise  higher  in  the  scale  of 
personality  tokens  of  hereditary  resemblance  approach  nearer 
and  nearer  to  curiosities.  In  any  case,  there  is  no  need  to  dwell 
long  upon  this  topic.  Our  question  is,  not  simply  the  facts  of 
the  Shakespearean  world,  but  the  representation  of  those  facts 
in  dramatic  forms ;  and  I  am  unable  to  see  that  any  element  of 
dramatic  form  is  associated  with  the  expression  of  heredity,  as 
this  term  is  generally  understood. 

There  is,  however,  something,  not  usually  comprised  under  the 
term  'heredity'  and  yet  closely  akin  to  it,  which  plays  a  great  part 
in  every  dramatic  system.  In  the  number  of  a  man's  ancestors 
we  ought  in  strictness  to  reckon  the  man  himself ;  not  only  is 


244  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

"  the  boy  the  father  to  the  man,"  but  the  past  of  each  individual 
Hfe  is  in  some  sort  an  ancestor  to  his  present  and  his  future. 
Heredity  is  habit  writ  large :  certain  repeated  actions  have  by 
repetition  become  easy,  they  pass  into  tendencies,  they  stiffen 
into  habits ;  and  such  habits  can  be  transmitted  from  one  in- 
dividual to  another,  whether  by  the  force  of  imitation,  or  of 
training,  or  perhaps  by  physical  propagation.  In  the  same  way, 
if  we  take  a  single  life  at  any  point  of  its  history,  we  shall  find 
accumulated  tendencies  and  habits  which  are  passing  on  from 
the  past  to  the  future  of  that  life  as  forces,  exerting  just  such 
influences  as  would  be  exerted  by  habits  and  qualities  derived 
by  that  Hfe  from  ancestral  lives.  Such  tendencies  transmitted 
from  the  past  to  the  present  will  be  varied,  and  often  mutually 
antagonistic  ;  but  as  we  compare  and  set  one  against  another  we 
are  usually  able  to  strike  a  balance,  or  determine  a  mathematical 
resultant  of  them  all,  which  we  call  the  individual's  '  character  ' : 
the  mark  or  stamp  distinguishing  him  from  other  individuals. 
Obviously,  character  is  one  of  the  forces  of  life,  and  a  force 
modifying  free  individual  action ;  we  call  the  man  a  free  agent, 
yet  we  expect  that  he  will  act  according  to  his  'character.'  The 
exact  nature  of  character  as  a  force  may  be  expressed  by  the 
word  momentum.  Steam  or  other  power  has  set  a  wheel  in  mo- 
tion ;  when  the  power  is  withdrawn  the  motion  continues,  and 
must  continue  until  the  acquired  momentum  is  counteracted  by 
friction  or  other  forces.  Similarly,  a  man's  character  is  the 
momentum  of  his  past:  new  influences  may  change  the  char- 
acter, but  in  the  absence  of  these  the  character  acquired  in  the 
past  is  a  real  force  carrying  the  individual  in  definite  directions. 
It  is  hardly  necessary  to  remark  that  character  is  one  of  the 
universally  recognised  elements  of  dramatic  effect.  The  posi- 
tion then  of  character  as  one  of  the  forces  modifying  personal 
will  becomes  important  in  the  moral  system  of  the  Shakespearean 
world.  The  poet  has  given  us  two  specially  interesting  studies 
of  this  topic,  the  momentum  of  character:  one  may  be  briefly 
stated,  the  other  will  need  detailed  analysis. 


THE   MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  245 

The  Caskets  Story  in  The  Merchant  of  Venice  is  a  dramatised 
problem.^  The  hand  of  Portia,  and  all  her  wealth,  is  by  her 
father's  will  destined  to  the  suitor  who  shall  choose  rightly 
between  three  caskets.  What  grounds  of  choice  are  there  for 
the  successive  candidates  ?  One  casket  is  of  gold,  another  of 
silver,  a  third  of  lead ;  the  golden  casket  has  the  inscription  — 

Who  chooseth  me  shall  gain  what  mauy  men  desire. 
There  is  another  inscription  for  the  silver  casket  — 

Who  chooseth  me  shall  get  as  much  as  he  deserves. 
Yet  another  inscription  is  on  the  casket  of  lead  — 

Who  chooseth  me  must  give  and  hazard  all  he  hath. 

If  there  is  an  inclination  to  connect  the  metal  of  the  casket 
with  the  idea  of  success  or  failure,  this  may  be  overthrown  by 
some  different  suggestions  from  the  mottoes ;  if  after  elaborate 
balancing  of  metal  against  motto  and  motto  against  metal 
ingenuity  can  still  find  some  preponderance  in  favour  of  one 
alternative,  there  is  yet  a  further  doubt  whether  —  in  what  pre- 
sents itself  as  a  puzzle  to  guess  —  the  preponderance  may  not 
have  been  anticipated  by  the  testator  who  propounds  the  puzzle, 
and  so  discounted.  To  all  appearance  the  prize  of  Portia  is 
staked  upon  absolute  chance. 

Such  is  the  problem  ;  what  is  the  solution  as  worked  out  in  the 
incident  dramatised  ?  We  are  permitted  to  hear  in  part  the 
train  of  argument  by  which  each  suitor,  as  he  thinks,  is  being 
led  to  his  decision  ;  all  the  while  we  are  in  a  position  to  see 
that,  not  their  reasoning,  but  their  whole  character  in  reality 
fixes  their  choice.  The  prince  of  Morocco  has  been  moulded 
by  royal  position  in  a  country  in  which  royalty  is  a  sort  of 
divinity:  anything  below  gold  is  secretly  repugnant  to  him, 
however  he  may  reason  ;  moreover,  his  soliloquy  betrays  that 

1  This  has  been  worked  out  at  length  in  my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist, 
Chapter  I. 


246  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  desire  of  many  men  has  been  the  real  bait  to  bring  him 
from  his  distant  home,  and  not  the  worth  of  Portia.  The  prince 
of  Arragon  has  been  stamped  into  a  character  by  aristocracy, 
and  its  theory  of  the  rule  of  desert : 


^ 


O  .  .  .  that  clear  honour 

Were  purchased  by  the  merit  of  the  wearer! 

How  many  then  should  cover  that  stand  bare ! 

How  many  be  commanded  that  command ! 

How  much  low  peasantry  would  then  be  glean'd 

From  the  true  seed  of  honour !  and  how  much  honour 

Pick'd  from  the  chaff  and  ruin  of  the  times 

To  be  new-varnish'd ! 

Accordingly  he  *  assumes  desert ' :  and  the  silver  casket  betrays 
him.  Bassanio  alone  has  come  in  the  character  of  a  true  lover, 
to  whom  the  giving  and  hazarding  of  all  for  his  love  is  more 
blessed  than  any  receiving.  Thus  the  incident  as  a  whole  — 
under  the  appearance  of  men  reasoning  in  an  issue  where  we 
see  reasoning  is  a  futile  weighing  of  evenly  balanced  alternatives 
—  in  reality  presents  the  momentum  of  character :  the  respective 
characters  of  three  men,  formed  by  the  reasonings  and  choices 
of  their  whole  past,  have  had  force  to  carry  them  over  a  crisis 
in  which  conscious  choice  was  no  more  than  a  self-deception. 

But  for  the  momentum  of  character  the  supreme  illustration 
is  the  career  of  Macbeth.  In  appreciating  character  as  a  force 
the  first  step  is  to  form  a  clear  conception  of  the  particular 
individuality  in  its  essential  features.  Here  a  difficulty  arises  : 
the  popular  conception  of  Macbeth  is  one  which,  as  it  appears 
to  me,  is  wholly  at  variance  with  the  evidence  of  the  play.  It 
dates  from  the  period  when  Shakespeare,  ignored  by  the  scholar- 
ship of  the  age,  was  left  to  the  theatre ;  and,  naturally,  the 
bias  of  stage  interpretation  is  rather  towards  what  is  impressive 
in  the  acting  than  what  rests  upon  the  weighing  of  evidence. 
This  traditional  reading  of  the  hero  —  apart  from  the  question 
of  its  correctness  —  is  no  doubt  interesting  in  itself.   \lt  is  that 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER         247 

of  a  great  soul  overborne  by  external  influence :]  some  say,  the 
influence  of  his  wife)  others  would  put  it,  the  temptation  of  the 
Witches ;  yet  others  would  combine  the  two.  Such  a  view  of 
Macbeth  appears  to  me  in  flat  contradiction  to  the  text  of  the 
play.  A  single  passage^ Ms  sufficient  to  disprove  it,  while  the 
view  of  the  hero  suggested  in  that  passage  is  in  harmony  with 
all  that  appears  of  Macbeth  from  beginning  to  end.  Let  us 
commence  by  examining  this  crucial  point  of  the  drama. 

The  situation  is  that  Macbeth  is  debating  whether  he  shall 
not  drop  the  plan  that  has  been  arranged  for  Duncan's  murder ; 
Lady  Macbeth  is  holding  her  husband  to  the  plot.  In  answer 
to  a  taunt  of  cowardice  Macbeth  has  spoken  big  words : 

I  dare  do  all  that  may  become  a  man ; 
Who  dares  do  more  is  none. 

Unfortunately,  Lady  Macbeth  is  able  to  make  this  rejoinder : 

What  beast  was't  then 
That  made  you  break  this  enterprise  to  me?  .  .  . 

Nor  time  nor  place 
Did  then  adhere,  and  yet  you  would  make  both : 
They  have  made  themselves. 

Macbeth  does  not  contradict  j  we  have  it  then,  on  the  admis- 
sion of  the  parties  themselves^hat  it  was  Macbeth  who  proposed 
the  murder  of  Duncan  to  his  wife,  and  not  Lady  Macbeth  to  her 
husband.  When  was  this  proposal  made  ?  Since  the  opening  of 
the  drama  Macbeth  and  his  wife  have  not  been  together  until  the 
day  when  the  above  words  are  spoken.  The  reference  cannot 
be  to  some  interview  earlier  in  the  same  day,  because  of  the 
note  of  time  Lady  Macbeth  gives — 


'^Macbeth:  I.  vii,  from  29.  Mrs.  Siddons  [quoted  in  the  Variorum  (second) 
edition,  page  473]  says, "  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  Macbeth,  in  the  first  instance, 
suggested  the  design  of  assassinating  the  King." 


248  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Nor  time  nor  place 
Did  then  adhere,  etc. 

These  words  can  apply  only  to  the  visit  of  Duncan ;  and  this 
visit  was  arranged,  and  made  known  by  Macbeth  to  his  wife, 
before  Macbeth  arrived  at  his  castle.^  Nor  can  the  proposal  of 
treason  —  as  I  have  sometimes  heard  it  suggested  — ;  have  been 
made  in  the  letter  sent  to  Lady  Macbeth.^  It  would  seem  to  be 
a  purposeless  absurdity  that  a  man  should  write  a  suggestion  of 
treason  and  murder  to  a  wife  he  will  presently  see  ;  moreover, 
we  hear  Lady  Macbeth  reading  the  letter,  which  seems  to  be  all 
about  the  meeting  with  the  Witches ;  when  it  has  been  read, 
Lady  Macbeth's  comment  implies  just  the  absence  of  what  it  is 
suggested  that  the  letter  might  have  contained  : 

I  do  fear  thy  nature ; 
It  is  too  full  o'  the  milk  of  human  kindness 
To  catch  the  nearest  way. 

There  is  no  escape  from  the  conclusion  that,  at  some  time 
before  the  commencement  of  the  drama,  and  thus  before  the 
meeting  between  Macbeth  and  the  Witches,  Macbeth  had  opened 
the  scheme  of  murder  to  his  wife.  One  thing  more  is  implied 
by  this   important   passage.      Lady  Macbeth  goes   on   to   use 

strange  language. 

I  have  given  suck,  and  know 
How  tender  'tis  to  love  the  babe  that  milks  me : 
I  would,  while  it  was  smiling  in  my  face, 
Have  pluck'd  my  nipple  from  his  boneless  gums, 
And  dashed  the  brains  out,  had  I  so  sworn  as  you 
Have  done  to  this. 

It  appears  then  that  Macbeth's  'breaking'  of  the  enterprise 
to  his  wife  was  no  cautious  suggestion  of  treason,  but  a  violent 
oath  of  resolve.  How  can  the  popular  tradition  of  Macbeth,  as 
a  soul  ruined  by  others,  stand  against  the  positive  revelation  of 
this  passage,  which  carries  us  back  to  a  period  before  the  com- 

1  Compare  I.  v.  32-38.  2  In  I.  v. 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  249 

mencement  of  the  play,  before  the  meeting  of  Macbeth  with  the 
Witches,  and  exhibits  him  as  breaking  to  his  wife  a  scheme  of 
treason  and  murder,  and  swearing  to  it  with  a  violence  which  the 
startled  wife  can  convey  only  by  using  the  most  terrible  image 
that  a  mother's  mind  could  call  up  ? 

When  this  traditional  misapprehension  has  been  cleared  out 
of  the  way,  it  is  not  difficult  to  form  a  definite  conception  for 
the  character  of  Shakespeare's  Macbeth.  \  So  far  as  an  individ- 
ual character  can  ever  be  summed  up  in  a  single  phrase, 
Macbeth  is  the  man  of  action.  In  our  antithesis  of  the  outer 
and  inner  life,  this  personage  would  stand  for  one  side  of  the 
antithesis  alone.  Like  Shakespeare's  Julius  Caesar,  an  exact 
converse  to  Shakespeare's  Hamlet,  Macbeth  is  strong,  quick,  full 
of  resource,  in  moments  of  action ;  feeble  and  vacillating  in 
moments  of  thinking  and  introspection.  To  differentiate  the 
character  still  further,  two  other  salient  features  may  be  noted, 
though  they  are  natural  consequences  of  the  first.  As  a  man  of 
action  Macbeth  is  specially  discomposed  by  suspense,  the  time 
of  strong  feeling  where  there  is  no  outlet  in  deeds.  Again,  it  is 
an  age  of  superstition :  unlike  Banquo,  who  doubts,  but  doubts 
with  an  open  mind,  and  unlike  Lady  Macbeth,  who  ignores  the 
supernatural  altogether,  Macbeth  himself  is  a  prey  to  supersti- 
tion ;  the  absence  of  any  inner  life  of  his  own  has  left  him  | 
defenceless  against  what  his  age  accepts.  These  three  things 
—  magnificent  capacity  for  action,  intolerance  of  suspense, 
proneness  to  superstition  —  make  a  definite  conception  for  the 
character  of  Shakespeare's  Macbeth,  and  become  a  triple  clue 
by  which  it  can  be  recognised  in  all  its  phases  of  development. 

We  are  now  to  watch  the  character  so  defined  gathering  force 
and  momentum  as  it  passes  through  successive  stages  of  the 
story.  Four  stages  may  be  recognised  in  the  developing 
activity  of  Macbeth.  His  first  crime  (the  murder  of  Duncan)  is 
a  thing  of  long  premeditation  and  brooding,  with  several  fluctu- 
ations of  purpose.  The  second  crime  (the  murder  of  the  grooms) 
is  the  impulse  of  a  single  moment.     With  the  third  crime  (the 


250  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

murder  of  Banquo)  we  find  something  like  deliberate  enjoyment 
of  slaughter.  In  the.  fourth  stage  Macbeth's  life  is  all  crime : 
he  is  hurried  from  one  violence  to  another  by  irresistible  frenzy. 
And,  side  by  side  with  this  increasing  capacity  for  evil  action, 
we  can  see  in  the  hero  of  the  play  how  suspense  grows  from  an 
uncomfortable  feeling  to  a  torturing  and  settled  disease ;  we  can 
see  again  how  the  superstition,  which  at  first  was  only  a  wonder, 
comes  in  time  to  be  for  Macbeth  his  sole  refuge  and  trust. 

Our  earliest  knowledge  of  Macbeth,  derived  from  the  passage 
of  the  play  analysed  above,  is  that  he  has  devoted  himself  by 
mighty  oath  to  treason  against  his  king,  the  time  for  executing 
the  treason  being  in  some  future  not  yet  seen.  Meanwhile 
Macbeth  has  become  the  hero  of  a  successful  war ;  returning 
from  this  war  he  is  met  by  the  Witches,^  who  hail  him  as  thane 
of  Glamis,  thane  of  Cawdor,  and  finally  add  — 

Thou  shalt  be  King  hereafter! 

Macbeth  starts:  how  is  this  start  to  be  interpreted?  The 
ordinary  view  of  the  hero  reads  this  start  as  the  shock  of  tempta- 
tion, that  moment  first  presented.  But  it  must  be  remembered 
that  there  was  nothing  strange  or  guilty  in  the  words  of  the 
Witches ;  Banquo,  who  is  present,  and  of  course  reflects  the 
ideas  of  the  time,  sees  nothing  sinister. 

Banquo.    Good  sir,  why  do  you  start,  and  seem  to  fear 
Things  that  do  sound  so  fair? 

The  crown  in  the  days  of  our  story  did  not  descend  according 
to  fixed  rules ;  it  was  at  the  moment  probable  enough  that  one 
so  high  in  the  line  of  succession  (though  not  the  highest)  should 
come  in  time  to  wear  the  crown ;  it  was  as  natural  for  fortune- 
tellers to  promise  Lord  Macbeth  the  throne  as  it  would  have 
been  for  them  to  promise  a  young  maid  a  handsome  husband. 
But  when  we  know  that  Macbeth,  according  to  Shakespeare's 
handling  of  the  story,  had  actually  sworn  before  this  to  the  crime 

1  L  iii,  from  38. 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  2$  I 

that  would  take  King  Duncan's  life,  then  we  easily  understand 
the  start  of  Macbeth,  as  he  finds  the  purpose  he  supposed  to  be 
the  secret  of  his  wife  and  himself  already  outside  him,  seeming 
to  glitter  in  the  malicious  gleams  of  a  witch's  laugh.  The  inci- 
dent continues  :  messengers  bring  Macbeth  tidings  of  his  eleva- 
tion to  the  thaneships  of  Glamis  and  Cawdor ;  naturally,  such  a 
testimony  to  the  prevision  of  the  Weird  Sisters  plunges  Macbeth 
in  thought.^ 

This  supernatural  soliciting 

Cannot  be  ill,  cannot  be  good  :   if  ill. 

Why  hath  it  given  me  earnest  of  success, 

Commencing  in  a  truth  ?     I  am  thane  of  Cawdor : 

If  good,  why  do  I  yield  to  that  suggestion 

Whose  horrid  image  doth  unfix  my  hair 

And  make  my  seated  heart  knock  at  my  ribs 

Against  the  use  of  nature  ?     Present  fears 

Are  less  than  horrible  imaginings ; 

My  thought,  whose  murder  — 

(I  interrupt  to  inquire,  whence  has  Macbeth  caught  the  idea  of 
murder  1  whence,  of  horrible  imaginings 'i  Not  from  the  inno- 
cent prediction  of  the  Witches  :  there  were  many  ways  —  suc- 
cession, election  —  by  which  without  improbability  this  kinsman 
of  the  King  might  succeed  to  the  crown.  It  is  from  Macbeth 's 
own  guilty  past  that  all  these  items  of  conspiracy  have  been 
fetched.     But  let  the  soliloquy  continue.) 

My  thought,  whose  murder  yet  is  but  fantastical, 
Shakes  so  my  single  state  of  man  that  function 
Is  smother'd  in  surmise,  and  nothing  is 
But  what  is  not. 

We  are  watching  Macbeth  shaken  by  suspense ;  the  common- 
place flattery  of  the  Witch  has  wakened  the  sleeping  treason, 
and  to  a  nature  like  Macbeth's  a  fearful  deed  present  for  the 
doing  is  more  easy  to  bear  than  the  imagination  of  the  deed  in 
the  future.     But  at  this  point  the  current  of  thought  changes. 

II.  iii,  from  130. 


252  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

If  chance  will  have  me  king,  why,  chance  may  crown  me, 
Without  my  stir. 

If  the  natural  course  of  events  —  as  the  Witches  say,  and  it 
never  occurs  to  Macbeth  to  doubt  their  insight  into  the  future  — 
is  going  to  bring  the  crown  to  Macbeth,  why  should  he  meddle 
with  such  dangerous  matter  as  treason  and  murder  ?  The  latter 
train  of  thought  prevails  :    Macbeth  will  wait. 

Come  what  come  may, 
Time  and  the  hour  runs  through  the  roughest  day. 

Thus  the  final  effect  of  the  meeting  between  Macbeth  and  the 
Witches  is  the  opposite  of  what  the  popular  view  of  the  play 
suggests  :  Macbeth  drops  the  treason  he  had  formerly  sworn  to 
execute,  and  is  content  to  wait  on  events. 

He  soon  resumes  his  treasonable  plans ;  but  why  ?  because  of 
a  fresh  appeal  to  his  practical  nature.  This  is  a  proclamation 
of  a  Prince  of  Cumberland,^  —  the  title  of  an  heir  apparent  to 
the  Scotch  throne,  as  the  title  Prince  of  Wales  still  describes  the 
heir  apparent  to  the  throne  of  England.  Such  an  incident 
removes  Macbeth 's  chance  of  attaining  the  crown  by  natural 
succession ;  he  must  fall  back  upon  his  former  guilty  purpose. 

The  Prince  of  Cumberland !   that  is  a  step 
On  which  I  must  fall  down,  or  else  o'erleap. 
For  in  my  way  it  lies.     Stars,  hide  your  fires ; 
Let  not  light  see  my  black  and  deep  desires : 
The  eye  wink  at  the  hand :  yet  let  that  be, 
Which  the  eye  fears,  when  it  is  done,  to  see. 

Now  opportunity  presents  itself,  in  the  unexpected  visit  of 

King  Duncan  to  his  subject's  castle.     As  Macbeth,  in  advance 

of  Duncan,  enters  his  castle,  he  is  met  by  his  wife  with  the 

words : 

You  shall  put 

This  night's  great  business  into  my  dispatch. ^ 
1  1.  iv,  from  35.  2  i.  v.  68. 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  253 

As  a  result  of  this  step  on  the  part  of  Lady  Macbeth  the  man 
of  action  is  left  with  nothing  to  do ;  all  the  interval  of  waiting 
till  night  shall  make  murder  possible  is  for  Macbeth  a  period  of 
prolonged  suspense,  and  he  is  accordingly  plunged  in  vacillation 
and  dread.  This  explains  his  extraordinary  conduct  in  leaving 
the  table  at  which  his  king  is  supping/  and  going  aside  to  pour 
out  his  feverish  thoughts  in  soliloquy.  The  famous  soliloquy^  of 
Macbeth  has  been  so  grandly  worded  by  the  poet  as  to  cast 
a  glamour  of  grandeur  upon  the  speaker.  But  if  we  look  at  the 
naked  thought  beneath  the  clothing  of  words,  we  find  nothing 
but  the  practical  man's  weighing  of  practical  consequences. 
Macbeth  says  to  himself  distinctly  that  it  would  be  well  to  do 
the  deed,  if  only  he  could  be  secured  against  the  consequences  ; 
against  the  consequences  in  this  life,  for  he  woulcT  "  jump  the 
life  to  come."  Macbeth  sees  clearly  that  the  murder  of  the  King 
would  outrage  loyalty,  hospitality,  pity,  kinship  ;  but  his  thought 
is  as  to  the  effect  of  these  outraged  feelings  on  others,  in  setting 
all  Scotland  weeping ;  he  shows  no  sign  of  revolting  against 
such  outrage  in  his  own  heart.  At  this  point ^  his  wife  joins 
Macbeth ;  and  the  scene  becomes  increasingly  significant. 
Those  who  hold  the  traditional  view  of  the  play  are  accustomed 
to  lay  special  stress  upon  this  phase  of  the  story ;  here,  at  least, 
(they  say)  we  have  Macbeth  seeking  to  abandon  his  treason,  and 
his  wife  holding  him  to  his  purpose.  But  careful  study  of  the 
text  will  not  support  this  view :  I  Macbeth 's  words  have  their 
reference,  not  to  abandoning  treason,  but  to  postponing  it.  We 
have  seen  that  it  is  Macbeth  himself  who  originated  the  purpose 
to  murder  Duncan ;  Lady  Macbeth  is  responsible  for  one  par- 
ticular plan  of  execution  —  the  murder  of  the  King  in  her  castle 
that  very  night.  The  dialogue  at  this  point  turns  upon  the 
latter  only  :  Macbeth  sees  the  risk  of  such  a  project,  and  would 
drop  it  and  trust  to  some  future  opportunity. 
Macbeth.    We  will  proceed  no  further  in  this  business.* 

1 1,  vii.  29.  8  I.  vii.  29. 

2  I.  vii.  1-28.  *  I.  vii.  31 ;  compare  I.  v.  68. 


254  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

(The  reader  will  remember  Lady  Macbeth 's  phrase  in  a  pre- 
ceding scene :  "  You  shall  put  this  night's  great  business  into 
my  dispatch.") 

Macbeth.     He  hath  honour'd  me  of  late ;  and  I  have  bought 
Golden  opinions  from  all  sorts  of  people, 
Which  would  be  worn  now  in  their  newest  gloss, 
Not  cast  aside  so  soon.i 

Macbeth  has  just  been  elevated  in  rank,  and  is  at  the  height  of 
his  popularity;  with  a  dreadful  instinct  of  economy  the  prac- 
tical man  suggests  it  would  be  well  to  get  all  that  can  be  got  out 
of  these  advantages,  before  risking  them  by  a  suspicious  deed. 
What  other  meaning  can  the  words  bear?  If  it  is  suggested 
that  compunction  of  conscience  and  sense  of  gratitude  to  Duncan 
are  rising  in  Macbeth,  how  ridiculous  the  sentence  becomes  1  it 
can  only  be  paraphrased  thus  :  Duncan  has  been  kind  to  me, 
and  I  must  not  murder  him  so  soon  !  These  words  so  soon  are 
of  themselves  sufficient  proof  that  the  question  is  of  postponing, 
not  of  abandoning  treason.  The  scene  proceeds  with  the  pas- 
sage already  analysed.  We  have  the  taunt,  the  rejoinder,  the 
reminder  of  Macbeth 's  original  proposal  and  violent  oath.  At 
last  the  real  thought  of  Macbeth  comes  out  — 

If  we  should  fail  ?  * 

Then  Lady  Macbeth  puts  her  full  scheme  before  her  husband  — 
to  drug  the  tired  grooms  and  make  the  deed  seem  theirs. 
Macbeth's  practical  instinct  seizes  a  feasible  scheme,  he  inter- 
rupts his  wife,  and  finishes  her  plan  for  her;  with  admiring 
exultation  he  accepts  the  murder  plan,  and  never  hesitates  until 
it  is  accomplished. 

It  is  now  a  period  of  action,^  and  Macbeth  is  seen  in  his 
strength ;  as  he  stands  in  the  castle  yard  at  night,  waiting  for 
his  wife's  signal,  his  words  breathe  exultation  and  a  sense  of 
mastery.     Here  we  get  the  first  of  several  phenomena  which 

1  j»  vii.  32-35.  2 1,  vii.  59.  8  ij.  i^  ii. 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  255 

illustrate  the  peculiar  psychology  of  Macbeth  —  his  tendency  to 
project  his  thoughts  in  objective  forms  ;  it  is  part  of  his  general 
superstition  that  he  has  such  difficulty  in  separating  between 
objective  and  subjective,  in  distinguishing  quickened  imagi- 
nation from  external  reality.  In  this  early  stage,  however, 
Macbeth  has  some  control  over  superstition  ;  when  his  intentness 
upon  murder  has  taken  form  as  a  dagger  floating  in  the  air  and 
marshalling  him  the  way  that  he  is  going,  he  does  question 
whether  it  is  a  false  creation,  or  whether  his  eyes  are  worth  all 
the  rest  of  his  senses.  It  is  noteworthy  that  in  this,  as  in  other 
cases  of  the  same  phenomenon,  the  objective  form  changes  with 
the  changing  thoughts  of  Macbeth ;  as  the  excited  imagination 
hurries  from  beginning  to  end  of  the  deed,  the  appearance  of  the 
dagger  undergoes  a  corresponding  variation  : 

I  see  thee  still ; 
And  on  thy  blade  and  dudgeon  gouts  of  blood, 
Which  was  not  so  before.^ 

The  intense  stillness  is  broken  by  the  signal  bell :  unhesitat- 
ingly Macbeth  passes  into  the  sacred  apartments  of  his  royal 
guest,  lightly  snatches  the  daggers  from  the  heavily  snoring 
grooms,  with  a  warrior's  sureness  of  stroke  plunges  them  into 
the  King's  body,  and  draws  them  forth  streaming  with  blood .^ 
The  boundary  of  murder  is  passed :  what  response  will  the 
universe  make  ?  A  sleepy  laugh :  a  nightmare  cry  of  '  Murder' ; 
two  sleepers  half  awaking ;  a  '  God  bless  us  !  '  and  an  '  Amen' : 
these  weird  omens  quiver  through  the  superstitious  soul  of  a 
warrior  who  would  have  known  how  to  encounter  a  room  full  of 
rousing  guards.  But  there  is  more  than  superstition  :  Macbeth, 
who  can  never  endure  a  single  moment's  suspense,  must  ivait^  ^ 
until  the  half-wakened  sleepers  have  slept  again.  Intent  on  the 
one  question,  whether  the  guards  are  yet  asleep,  Macbeth  finds 

1 II.  i.  45. 

2  The  scene  in  the  King's  chamber  has  to  be  inferred  from  details  in  II.  ii. 
8  Compare  II.  ii.  24 :  "  I  stood  and  heard  them," 


256  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

his  thoughts  travelling  outside  him,  and  becoming  objective  as 

a  voice :  ^ 

Sleep  no  more ! 
Macbeth  does  murder  sleep  .  .  . 

As  Macbeth  whispers  the  incident  to  his  wife  he  cannot  make 
her  understand,  he  cannot  make  us  understand,  whether  this 
was  a  real  voice,  how  much  was  his  own  thought.  But  as  he 
stands  in  panic  of  suspense  the  shriek  of  an  owP  above  his 
head  plunges  him  into  the  depths  of  demoralisation,  and,  for- 
getful of  all,  he  speaks  aloud  ^  as  he  springs  down  the  steps  to 
reach  the  courtyard.  Amid  the  tempest  that  just  begins  to  howl 
Macbeth  incoherently  seeks  to  make  known  what  has  happened  ; 
reminded  that  he  has  spoiled  the  plot  by  bringing  the  grooms' 
daggers  ^  away  he  is  helpless  to  repair  the  mistake,  and  his  wife 
must  do  what  the  warrior  dares  not  face.  The  tempest  is  now 
furious  :  but  through  its  bowlings  is  heard  the  knocking  of  those 
who  are  come  to  wake  the  King ;  so  demoralised  still  is  Macbeth, 
through  his  moment  of  suspense  and  shock  of  ill  omen,  that  he 
has  a  vague  fear  that  this  knocking  will  wake  the  King,  until  the 
approach  of  a  call  to  act  steadies  his  brain,  and  he  realises  the 
whole  situation : 

Wake  Duncan  with  thy  knocking  !   I  would  thou  couldst ! 

There  is  an  interval  of  a  minute  or  two  —  it  cannot  be  more  ® 
—  and  Macbeth  appears  before  us  again  a  totally  changed  man. 
The  chamberlains  entering  the  courtyard  encounter  their  host 
as  a  nobleman  of  dignified  bearing:  the  man  of  action  easily 
attains  self-control  when  it  is  a  question  of  meeting  an  emer- 
gency in  the  presence  of  his  fellow-men.  The  awful  discovery  is 
made,  and  loud-voiced  consternation  rouses  the  castle :  Macbeth 
plays  perfectly  his  role  of  startled  innocence.  He  seizes  the 
hand  of  Lennox,  and  the  two  rush  to  the  scene  of  death,  as  if  to 


ill.ii.  35.  2n.ii.  16.  sil.ii.  17.  4  n.  ii,  from  48. 

fi  The  knocking  within  makes  Scenes  ii  and  iii  (of  Act  II)  continuous. 


THE  MOMENTUM   OF  CHARACTER  257 

see  whether  the  tidings  can  be  true.^  But  a  moment  of  crisis  is 
awaiting  Macbeth.  The  two  nobles  leave  the  courtyard  together, 
and  return  together  :  it  can  be  but  a  single  second  that  Macbeth 
lingers  behind  in  the  royal  chamber  after  Lennox  has  left  it. 
But  that  instant  was  a  moment  of  horrible  suspense :  there  were 
the  grooms  heavily  sleeping,  soon  to  be  roughly  wakened  and 
given  opportunity  to  tell  their  tale  :  the  guilty  man  cannot  wait, 
but  in  overpowering  impulse  of  action  stabs  the  grooms,  and 
thereby  ruins  the  deeply  laid  plot.  It  is  true  that  when  he  has 
recovered  himself  in  the  presence  of  the  courtiers  listening  to 
Lennox's  horrified  description  of  the  scene,  Macbeth  almost 
repairs  his  blunder  by  the  innocent  way  in  which  he  makes 
known  what  he  has  done.^ 

Macbeth.    O,  yet  I  do  repent  me  of  my  fury, 
That  I  did  kill  them. 

Macduff.  Wherefore  did  you  so  ? 

Macbeth.   Who  can  be  wise,  amazed,  temperate  and  furious, 

Loyal  and  neutral,  in  a  moment  ?   .  .  .     Here  lay  Duncan, 
His  silver  skin  laced  with  his  golden  blood, 
And  his  gash'd  stabs  look'd  like  a  breach  in  nature 
For  ruin's  wasteful  entrance  :  there,  the  murderers 
Steep'd  in  the  colours  of  their  trade  .  .  . 

It  is  a  splendid  piece  of  acting,  but  of  no  avail :  every  hearer 
seizes  the  truth,  and  it  is  only  accident  that  saves  Macbeth. 
Lady  Macbeth's  timely  fainting^  produces  a  moment's  diversion, 
and  the  courtiers  feel  they  must  pause  *  before  determining  the 
question  of  guilt :  in  that  hour's  pause  the  flight  of  the  King's 
sons  turns  suspicion  in  another  direction,*  and  instead  of  holding 
Macbeth  guilty  the  nobles  call  him  to  the  throne. 

Our  review  of  the  story  has  passed  through  two  out  of  the 
four  stages  of  Macbeth's  life.  We  have  seen  how  his  first  crime 
was  the  close  of  a  long  period  of  brooding  and  of  changing  pur- 

1  II.  iii,  from  70.  8  n,  jij,  123. 

2  11.  iii.  112.  4  II.  iii^  from  132. 
5  Compare  II.  iii.  127-129  with  II.  iv.  22-32. 

S 


258  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

pose ;  when  once  he  had  passed  the  boundary  Hne  between  in- 
nocence and  guilt  the  evil  in  Macbeth  had  attained  a  sudden 
impetus,  and  the  murder  of  the  grooms  was  the  suggestion  and 
execution  of  a  single  moment  of  time.  We  pass  to  a  third  stage, 
in  which  evil  will  have  gained  a  still  surer  hold  upon  the  sinner. 
But  our  first  note  of  this  third  stage  is  the  way  in  which  the 
feeling  of  suspense,  hitherto  a  thing  of  recurrencCj  has  now 
become  to  Macbeth  a  continuous  agony. 

Macbeth.   We  have  scotched  the  snake,  not  kilPd  it  .  .  . 

But  let  the  frame  of  things  disjoint,  both  the  worlds  suffer, 

Ere  we  will  eat  our  meal  in  fear,  and  sleep 

In  the  affliction  of  these  terrible  dreams 

That  shake  us  nightly  :  better  be  with  the  dead. 

Whom  we,  to  gain  our  peace,  have  sent  to  peace, 

Than  on  the  torture  of  the  mind  to  lie 

In  restless  ecstasy.^ 

It  is  indeed  this  torture  of  suspense  which  leads  to  Macbeth's 
third  crime,  the  murder  of  Banquo.  For  we  must  distinguish : 
the  precise  issue  here  is  not  simply  the  slaying  of  Banquo  — 
sooner  or  later  the  rivalry  of  the  two  men  must  have  ended  in 
violence  ^  —  but  the  slaying  of  Banquo  at  the  precise  moment 
when  he  is  slain.  The  time  is  so  close  to  the  death  of  Duncan 
that  it  would  be  impossible  but  that  the  one  crime  should  draw 
attention  to  the  other ;  in  actual  fact,  one  scene  ^  of  the  play 
brings  out,  in  the  innuendoes  of  Lennox,  that  the  suspicions 
diverted  from  Macbeth  by  the  flight  of  Duncan's  sons  are  all 
brought  back  again  by  the  murder  of  Banquo.  How  comes  it 
that  the  politic  Macbeth  acts  so  rashly  ?  The  clue  is  given  in 
his  words  to  his  rival :  "* 

We  hear,  our  bloody  cousins  are  bestow'd 
In  England  and  in  Ireland,  not  confessing 
Their  cruel  parricide,  filling  their  hearers 

iIII.  ii.  13.  «III.  vi. 

2  Compare  III.  i,  49-72.  *  III.  i.  30. 


THE  MOMENTUM  OF  CHARACTER  259 

With  strange  invention  :  but  of  that  to-morrow, 
When  therewithal  we  shall  have  cause  of  state 
Craving  us  jointly. 

It  appears  that  the  time  is  the  day  preceding  a  Council  of  State 
in  which  the  King  and  his  nobles  must  hear  for  the  first  time 
the  representations  of  Duncan's  sons,  who  at  present  are  supposed 
by  all  to  be  the  murderers  of  their  father.  Precisely  as  in  the 
matter  of  the  grooms,  Macbeth  cannot  endure  the  suspense  of 
waiting  for  the  critical  moment;  and  this  torturing  suspense 
impels  him,  in  the  face  of  every  reason  of  policy  to  the  con- 
trary, to  get  rid  of  the  most  formidable  of  the  councillors.  As 
to  its  mode  of  operation,  this  third  crime  of  Macbeth  displays 
deliberate  contrivance,  appreciation  of  professional  murderers 
as  tools  of  crime,  and  even  a  suggestion  of  the  artistic  enjoy- 
ment that  comes  with  facility.^  Macbeth  will  not  in  plain  terms 
reveal  his  purpose  to  his  wife,  but  this  is  the  tone  in  which  he 
speaks  of  it. 

Then  be  thou  jocund  :  ere  the  bat  hath  flown 

His  cloister'd  flight,  ere  to  black  Hecate's  summons 

The  shard-borne  beetle  with  his  drowsy  hums 

Hath  rung  night's  yawning  peal,  there  shall  be  done 

A  deed  of  dreadful  note  .  .  .  Come,  seeling  night, 

Scarf  up  the  tender  eye  of  pitiful  day ; 

And  with  thy  bloody  and  invisible  hand 

Cancel  and  tear  to  pieces  that  great  bond 

Which  keeps  me  pale  !    Light  thickens  ;  and  the  crow 

Makes  wing  to  the  rooky  wood  : 

Good  things  of  day  begin  to  droop  and  drowse ; 

Whiles  night's  black  agents  to  their  preys  do  rouse. 

Thou  marvell'st  at  my  words  :  but  hold  thee  still ; 

Things  bad  begun  make  strong  themselves  by  ill. 

It  is  in  the  reaction  from  this  third  crime  that  we  see  most 
clearly  the  advancing  hold  of  superstition  upon  Macbeth.    From 

1  Compare,  generally,  III.  i,  from  72;  and  III.  ii,  from  37. 


26o  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

the  first  he  has  taken  for  granted  the  supernatural,  as  repre- 
sented in  the  oracles  of  the  Weird  Sisters ;  and  from  the  first 
we  have  noted  his  tendency  to  project  his  thoughts  as  external 
sights  and  sounds.  But  in  the  case  of  the  airy  dagger  Macbeth 
could  question  ;  even  when  he  describes  the  voice  crying,  "  Sleep 
no  more,"  he  at  least  leaves  a  confusion  between  thought  and 
sound.  But  in  the  apparition  of  Banquo's  Ghost  Macbeth  has 
lost  all  power  to  discriminate  between  objective  and  subjective. 
It  is  only  an  apparition :  no  eye  sees  it  but  Macbeth's,  and  the 
stage-directions  are  only  intended  to  assist  us  as  to  what  Mac- 
beth is  supposed  to  see.  Yet  not  only  is  Macbeth  slow  in 
realising  this  fact,  even  after  his  wife  has  spoken  to  him,  but 
from  beginning  to  end  of  the  scene  his  peculiar  psychology  is 
illustrated,  and  successive  stages  of  his  thinking  reflect  them- 
selves in  successive  modifications  of  the  apparition. 

It  is  necessary  to  analyse  the  scene  ^  with  some  minuteness. 
We  must  imagine  a  banqueting  chamber,  and  a  table  of  horse- 
shoe shape,  the  curved  end  towards  the  side  of  the  chamber 
adjoining  the  kitchen  and  offices,  where  a  crowd  of  servants  are 
standing ;  the  other  end  flanked  by  two  chairs  of  state,  and 
pointing  towards  the  hall  in  which  the  guests  are  assembling. 
Macbeth  leads  the  procession  into  the  banqueting  chamber,  and 
ceremoniously  hands  his  queen  to  one  of  the  chairs  of  state ; 
instead  of  taking  the  other  himself  he  passes  forward  with  the 

words : 

Ourself  will  mingle  with  society 
And  play  the  humble  host. 
Our  hostess  keeps  her  state. 

To  the  guests  this  seems  no  more  than  an  act  of  graceful  con- 
descension ;  Macbeth's  real  purpose  in  keeping  for  himself  the 
middle  seat  at  the  curved  end  of  the  horseshoe  is  to  be  near  the 
crowd  of  servants,  so  that  he  can,  without  difficulty,  communicate 
with  the  messenger  he  is  so  anxiously  awaiting.     Even  before 

1  III.  iv. 


THE  MOMENTUM   OF  CHARACTER  26 1 

he  has  taken  his  seat  he  catches  sight  of  the  murderer ;  forget- 
ting state,  he  passes  on  to  him  and  says : 

There's  blood  upon  thy  face. 

We  may  be  sure  that  a  professional  bravo  would  know  his  busi- 
ness better  than  to  pass  through  a  crowd  of  servants  with  tokens 
of  crime  about  him :  the  blood  is  of  course  in  Macbeth's  imagi- 
nation. The  news  is  spoken,  and  the  fearful  shock  of  safety 
and  danger  mixed  makes  the  King's  brain  reel.  But  a  voice 
from  the  Queen  recalls  him  to  the  duties  of  host,  and  Macbeth, 
advancing  toward  the  table,  resolves  —  with  the  quickness  of  a 
man  of  action  —  to  prepare  beforehand  for  the  inevitable  dis- 
covery, and  let  the  court  know  his  devotion  to  Banquo.  As  he 
speaks  his  words  of  regret  for  the  absence  of  their  chief  guest, 
the  apparition  fills  the  vacant  seat  in  the  centre  of  the  curve. 
Macbeth  is  still  standing  between  the  table  and  the  servants : 
what  he  sees  is  only  the  form  of  the  ghostly  figure,  indistinguish- 
able from  any  other  figure  of  a  guest ;  as  he  says,  the  table  simply 
seems  full.  But  when  other  guests  point  to  the  empty  chair,  we 
must  suppose  that  the  apparition  turns  and  faces  his  murderer. 

Macbeth.  Which  of  you  have  done  this  ? 

Lords.  What,  my  good  lord  ? 

Macbeth.  Thou  canst  not  say  I  did  it :  never  shake 
Thy  gory  locks  at  me. 

Evidently  the  apparition  has  undergone  a  change :  had  there 
been  "  gory  locks  "  upon  the  head  at  first,  Macbeth  could  not 
have  mistaken  it  for  the  figure  of  an  ordinary  guest  in  pronounc- 
ing the  table  full.  In  the  wild  scene  that  follows  still  further 
change  is  evident. 

Macbeth.  The  times  have  been 

That,  when  the  brains  were  out,  the  man  would  die, 
And  there  an  end  ;  but  now  they  rise  again, 
With  twenty  mortal  murders  on  their  crowns. 


262  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

The  murderer  in  describing  the  deed  to  Macbeth  had  spoken  of 
"  twenty  trenched  gashes  on  his  head,  the  least  a  death  to 
nature  " :  ^  the  detail  has  sunk  in  Macbeth's  excited  mind,  and 
reproduced  itself  in  the  apparition.  In  time,  Macbeth  is  made  to 
understand  that  no  eye  but  his  own  has  seen  the  ghost.  There 
is  now  one  more  chance  for  the  man  of  action  to  recover  the 
ground  lost  by  his  blunder.  Macbeth  will  pursue  his  policy^  of 
speaking  endearingly  of  Banquo  :  hitherto  he  has  been  taken  by 
surprise,  supposing  that  all  recognised  the  ghost,  but  now  he 
determines  by  force  of  will  to  keep  down  his  tremors,  and 
bravely  face  the  apparition,  which  he  knows  his  words  will  re- 
call, ^o  he  strains  his  nerves,  and  proposes  the  health  of 
Banquo.     The  ghost  reappears  :  but  in  what  form  ? 

Macbeth.     Avaunt !  and  quit  my  sight !  let  the  earth  hide  thee ! 
Thy  bones  are  marrowless,  thy  blood  is  cold  ; 
Thou  hast  no  speculation  in  those  eyes 
Which  thou  dost  glare  with. 

The  idea  of  blood  and  murder  in  general,  the  idea  of  Banquo  as 
a  living  man  like  other  men,  Banquo  bleeding,  Banquo  pierced 
with  twenty  mortal  wounds,  Banquo  a  corpse  dead  and  moulder- 
ing in  the  grave :  these  are  naturally  the  successive  stages  of 
Macbeth's  thought  at  this  crisis,  and  these  are  the  successive 
forms  presented  by  the  apparition,  which  only  the  criminal's  own 
brain  has  created.  So  completely  has  imagination  now  become 
reality. 

We  have  reached  the  fourth  and  last  stage  of  Macbeth's 
career.  It  is  now  no  longer  a  question  of  single  crimes :  a  daily 
diet^  of  violence  and  horror  afflicts  Scotland;  beholders  speak 
of  madness  or  valiant  fury;  Macbeth  himself  expresses  the 
accelerated  impetus  of  his  downward  rush,  as  he  says  that  his 
deeds  must  be  acted  ere  they  may  be  scanned.*  Before  this 
point  superstition  has  been  his  ruin  ;  yet  from  the  scene  of  the 

1  III.  iv.  27.  «  IV.  iii.  4. 

2  From  line  88.  *  III.  iv.  140. 


Ttifi  MoMEm-tjM  OF  CHAkACT£R  263 

apparition  he  betakes  himself  to  the  Weird  Sisters,^  and  makes 
the  supernatural  his  sole  refuge.  But  what  are  we  to  say  as  to 
the  third  note  of  Macbeth's  character  ?  Already  suspense  had 
become  to  him  a  settled  state  of  torture ;  in  his  final  stage  the 
torture  of  suspense  yields  to  its  opposite.  The  Witches  delude 
their  victim  with  ambiguous  oracles  :  Macbeth  feels  a  sense  of 
calm  trust  replacing  his  gnawing  dread.^ 

Sweet  bodements  !  good  ! 
Rebellion's  head,  rise  never  till  the  wood 
Of  Birnam  rise,  and  our  high-placed  Macbeth 
Shall  live  the  lease  of  nature,  pay  his  breath 
To  time  and  mortal  custom ; 

It  is  just  as,  in  a  physical  body  decaying  with  disease,  there 
comes  a  point  where  agonising  pain  gives  place  to  a  numbness, 
which  means  mortification.  Beyond  the  stage  of  painful  sus- 
pense there  comes  to  Macbeth  the  stage  of  sweet  security,  which 
is  the  mortification  of  the  soul.  And  from  such  security  Mac- 
beth is  awakened  only  by  the  shock  of  final  ruin. 

Such  then  is  the  clearly  marked  character  of  this  famous 
hero  of  Shakespearean  drama,  and  such  is  the  movement 
through  which,  with  ever  increasing  force,  that  character  is 
hurried.  He  is  the  man  of  action,  intolerant  of  suspense, 
defenceless  against  popular  superstition.  Crime  draws  him  on 
through  stages  of  long  hesitation,  of  sudden  impulse,  of  satisfied 
acceptance,  of  headlong  passion.  At  first  he  can  reason  with 
suspense,  then  it  becomes  an  unmanning  bewilderment  in  which 
he  ruins  the  scheme  he  has  so  much  admired ;  then  suspense 
becomes  a  chronic  disease ;  finally  it  yields  to  the  more  terrible 
opposite  stage  of  blind  security.  Superstition  is,  at  first,  one  of 
the  sources  to  which  Macbeth  looks  for  guidance  ;  later,  ominous 
words  of  sleepers  are  enough  to  drive  him  from  mastery  of  a 
crisis  to  helpless  imbecihtyj  soon  he  is  unable  to  distinguish 
superstition  and  reality;  at  last,  superstition  is  his  only  hope. 

1  III.  iv.  132.  2 IV.  i.  96. 


264  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

By  free  choice  and  wilful  passion  Macbeth  has  embraced  for  him- 
self a  career  of  crime ;  when  once  he  has  brought  his  life  to  the 
point  of  passing  from  purpose  to  murderous  deed,  he  has  attained 
a  terrible  momentum  of  character  which  hurls  him  to  his  ruin. 


/  Heredity  is  a  limitation  upon  personal  will  from  within ;  a 

corresponding  limitation  from  without  is  expressed  by  the  term 
*  environment.'  In  a  sense,  the  whole  universe  may  be  consid- 
ered as  the  environment  of  each  individual  in  it.  The  present 
/  chapter,  however,  confines  itself  to  the  more  immediate  environ- 
ment that  we  call  circumstance ;  remoter  forces  will  be  treated 
later. 

The  influence  of  circumstances  upon  individual  action  is  a 
/  thing  too  obvious  to  be  interesting,  too  multiform  to  admit  of 
analysis.  Here,  as  in  other  cases,  our  question  is  whether 
there  is  any  association  of  dramatic  form  with  the  force  of 
circumstance.  Those  who  take  an  interest  in  the  analysis  of 
plot  will  recognise  something  which  answers  to  this  description. 
Shakespeare's  plots  are  harmonies  of  several  stories,  or,  as  they 
are  technically  called,  actions,  combined  in  a  single  design. 
When  a  plot  has  been  analysed  into  its  constituent  actions,  there 
is  generally  one  of  these  which  is  of  a  different  character  from 
all  the  rest ;  it  is  the  Enveloping  Action  lying  outside  the  others, 
and  seeming  to  envelop  them,  like  the  frame  of  a  picture  or  the 
fringe  round  a  pattern.  This  element  of  dramatic  plot  cor- 
responds to  something  in  real  life.  The  main  force  in  life  (we 
have  seen)  is  individual  will ;  but  the  individual  is  a  part  of  the 
state  or  community,  and  this  state  has  a  life  and  a  movement  of 
its  own,  a  broader  sphere  of  action  in  which  the  personal  actions 
proper  to  stories  are  merged.  To  take  the  simplest  illustration. 
A  story  turns  upon  the  love  of  a  man  and  a  maiden ;  the  rise 
and  progress  of  this  love,  its  difficulties,  interruptions,  and  happy 
restoration.  Perhaps  there  is  nothing  that  these  two  individuals 
think  less  about  than  the  politics  of  the  country  in  which  they 


THE  SWAY   OF  CIRCUMSTANCE  265 

reside.  Yet  the  course  of  its  political  history  may  greatly  affect 
the  story  of  love:  war  may  break  out,  the  lovers  may  be 
separated,  separations  may  produce  jealousy  and  rivalry :  after 
all,  the  course  of  true  love  may  have  run  smoothly  or  roughly 
according  to  the  twists  and  turns  of  political  history.  The 
enveloping  action  in  fiction  is  usually  just  what  we  call  '  history,* 
as  distinguished  from  '  story  ' ;  if  not  exactly  history,  it  is  some 
sphere  of  action  larger  and  broader  than  the  individual  interests 
which  are  the  proper  sphere  of  story. 

In  the  play  of  Richard  the  Third  we  saw  how  the  enveloping 
action  was  the  Wars  of  the  Roses;  the  details  making  up  the 
matter  of  the  drama  are  so  many  items  in  the  political  conflicts 
of  Lancaster  and  York.  In  Romeo  and  Juliet  the  enveloping"! 
action  is  the  old  feud  of  Montague  and  Capulet ;  in  The  J 
Mercha?itof  Venice  the  feud  of  Jew  and  Christian.  In  Cyinbeline 
we  have  the  war  for  subjection  or  independence  between  Rome 
and  Britain.  There  is  the  Florentine  war  to  play  a  similar  part 
in  AlVs  Well  that  Ends  Well,  In  Lear  we  find  a  war  of  the  rival 
countries  England  and  France;  in  Hamlet  a  war  of  Denmark 
and  Norway ;  in  Othello  a  naval  war  of  Venice  with  the  Turks. 
To  most  readers,  no  doubt,  this  particular  element  in  the  various 
plays  is  of  little  importance,  or  it  is  altogether  overlooked.  But 
it  was  otherwise  with  the  poet  himself ;  and  those  who  delight 
to  trace  the  fine  workmanship  of  the  dramatist  will  see  clear 
evidences  of  design  and  contrivance  in  the  way  this  enveloping 
action  is  regularly  worked  into  the  design  of  the  plot.  A  good 
illustration  is  the  play  of  Much  Ado  about  Nothing.  Here  the 
enveloping  action  is  the  war  between  the  Prince  and  his  bastard 
brother :  one  of  those  petty  faction  conflicts  with  which  Italian 
history  is  rife,  of  no  interest  in  itself  to  readers  of  the  story. 
Yet  Shakespeare  takes  pains  to  insinuate  this  thread  of  action 
into  the  leading  points  of  the  movement,  letting  it  just  appear 
at  the  beginning,  the  turning  point,  and  the  end.  The  defeat  of 
Don  John  makes  the  opening  situation,  by  which  the  personages 
are  drawn  together  to  exert  influence  on  one  another :  it  is  the 


^66  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF   SHAKESPEARE 

return  from  the  war  which  brings  Claudio  to  indulge  his  love 
for  Hero,  Benedick  to  tease  and  be  teased  by  Beatrice,  Don 
John  himself  in  sullen  submission  to  look  around  for  opportuni- 
ties of  mischief.^  When  the  villanous  design  against  Hero's 
honour,  which  is  the  foundation  of  the  plot,  has  been  unex- 
pectedly discovered,  Don  John  is  compelled  to  flee,  and  the 
rebellion  which  makes  the  enveloping  action  is  reinstated.^  And 
wheti  this  sad  complication  has  at  last  attained  complete  and 
happy  resolution,  though  the  reader  has  forgotten  all  about  Don 
John  and  civil  war,  yet  Shakespeare  devotes  a  few  final  lines  to 
arrival  of  news  that  the  rebel  has  once  more  been  defeated, 
and  the  enveloping  action  has  thus  come  to  a  close .^  Another 
example  is  A  Midsummer- Nigh fs  Dream.  The  matter  of  the  play 
is  the  gossamer  substance  of  fairy  life,  with  arbitrary  accidents 
of  love  as  fanciful  as  the  title  of  the  poem  suggests.  Yet  all  this 
is  enclosed  in  the  substantial  framework  of  public  life  and  state 
ceremonial,  an  enveloping  action  of  the  Marriage  of  Theseus 
and  Hippolyta,  which  connects  itself  with  every  thread  of  the 
design.  For  this  public  function  the  youths  of  Athens  have 
prepared  their  farcical  tragedy;  Oberon  and  Titania  have  come 
from  infinite  distance  for  this  precise  occasion ;  their  mutual 
jealousy  is  jealousy  of  the  royal  bride  and  bridegroom,  their 
renewed  amity  will  crown  the  wedding  day  with  midnight  fairy 
dance ;  when  in  the  morning  light  the  human  lovers  awake 
from  their  tangled  experience,  their  strange  situation  is  by  the 
King  and  his  bride  put  down  to  connection  with  the  wedding 
ceremonies  and  sports: 

No  doubt  they  rose  up  early  to  observe 
The  rite  of  May ;  and,  hearing  our  intent, 
Came  here  in  grace  of  our  solemnity."* 

The  amount  of  motive  influence  exerted  by  the  enveloping 
action  upon  the  rest  of  the  movement  is  substantial,  although 

i  Much  Ado  I.  i,  iii.  2  Compare  V.  ii.  63.  8  V.  iv.  127. 

*  Midiummer-Nights  Dream  I.  ii ;  II.  i.  69-76 ;  IV.  i.  92 ;  IV.  i.  129. 


THE   SWAY  OF  CIRCUMSTANCE  267 

the  influence  is  indirect.  In  Richard  the  Third,  not  only  is  the 
matter  of  the  play  part  of  the  Wars  of  the  Roses,  but  Richard 
himself,  and  the  lesser  personages,  are  a  creation  of  those  faction 
fights,  and  are  inspired  by  the  passions  of  the  wars.  The  feud 
of  Montague  and  Capulet  has  determined  the  peculiar  type  of 
love  for  the  play  —  the  love  that  is  binding  together  born 
enemies ;  the  feud  makes  all  the  difficulties  for  this  course  of 
true  love,  and  turns  it  finally  into  a  terrible  tragedy.  Persecu- 
tion of  Jews  by  Christians  not  only  accounts  for  much  in  the 
character  of  Shylock,  but  even  determines  largely  the  action  of 
Antonio  and  other  Christians.  In  Cymbeline,  the  war  has  the 
effect  of  drawing  together  the  personages  of  the  play  as  the 
movement  progresses ;  it  is  this  which  brings  Posthumus  and 
lachimo  from  Italy  back  to  Britain ;  it  draws  Imogen  into  the 
Roman  host  and  the  meeting  with  her  husband  ;  it  attracts  the 
royal  boys  and  their  foster-father  into  the  conflict  in  which  their 
fresh  valour  is  to  reverse  the  current  of  events.  Notably  in  Lear 
the  French  war  draws  all  the  several  personages  to  a  meeting 
point  which  makes  a  crisis.  In  Hamlet,  the  first  thought  of 
those  who  see  the  Ghost  in  armour  is  of  the  warlike  preparations 
going  on  around  them  ;  our  first  sight  of  the  hero  at  court  is  in 
connection  with  an  embassy  which  diverts  the  threatened  war 
into  another  channel ;  the  casual  passage  of  troops  later  in  the 
play  rouses  Hamlet  to  the  task  in  which  he  has  been  flagging  ; 
when  the  catastrophe  has  exhausted  the  royal  house  of  Denmark, 
Hamlet  with  dying  breath  recognises  the  claims  to  succession  of 
Fortinbras,  who  is  just  returning  in  triumph  from  the  war.  An 
interesting  case  is  the  play  of  Lovers  Labour's  Lost.  Here  the 
enveloping  action  is  a  political  negotiation:  it  appears  only 
at  two  points.  The  arrival  of  the  French  princess  and  her 
suite  to  conduct  this  negotiation  brings  a  force  of  young  and 
healthy  life  to  confound  the  solemn  plans  of  Navarre :  humour 
dissolves  solemnity,  and  all  gradually  works  out  to  a  complete 
dramatic  finish.  But  then  a  turn  comes  in  the  enveloping 
action  —  the  death  of  the  French  King  whom  the  embassy  rep- 


/ 


268  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

resents.^  At  once  a  serious  tone  is  thrown  over  the  comic 
denouement ;  the  love  that  has  been  made  in  jest  is  concluded 
in  earnest. 

*  The  sway  of  circumstances:'  this  expression,  I  think,  con- 
veys that  element  of  life  to  which  the  enveloping  action  of 
dramatic  plot  corresponds.  Just  as  the  moon,  with  unseen 
agency  and  at  infinite  distance,  draws  the  tides  of  the  sea  its 
own  way ;  just  as  the  swing  of  Earth  on  its  axis,  that  no  atten- 
tive discrimination  can  detect,  yet  carries  mankind  through  its 
phases  of  day  and  night ;  so  the  enveloping  history,  remote  as  it 
may  be  from  individual  interest  of  story,  becomes  a  force  to 
mould  and  sway  the  story's  course.  The  sway  then  of  cir- 
cumstance, and  the  momentum  of  character,  make  the  dramatic 
counterparts  to  the  two  most  obvious  limitations  of  individual 
will  —  environment  and  heredity. 

It  may  be  added,  that  in  certain  cases  it  is  the  larger  life  of 
the  state  and  community  which  the  drama  brings  into  promi- 
nence, while  individual  action  with  its  story  interest  falls  into  a 
subordinate  place.  But  this  differentiates  a  special  dramatic 
type  ;  side  by  side  with  tragedy  and  comedy,  Shakespeare  has 
given  us  the  history,  as  the  play  in  which  the  enveloping  action 
is  predominant  over  all  the  rest  of  the  plot. 

1  Love's  Labour's  Lost  V.  ii,  from  725. 


XIII 

THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY 

Our  survey  of  the  Shakespearean  world  has  reached  the  point 
where,  as  dramatised  in  the  enveloping  action,  we  have  seen  history 
enfolding  story,  the  larger  Hfe  of  the  state  or  nation  touching,  yet 
lying  outside,  the  narrower  life  of  personality.  Between  the  two 
things  thus  brought  together  there  is  one  obvious  difference.  Story 
must,  in  the  nature  of  things,  be  complete ;  unless  the  course  of 
individual  action  has  run  its  full  round,  so  that  nemesis,  pathos,  or 
similar  principles  are  caught,  there  is  no  story.  On  the  contrary, 
the  history  that  makes  an  enveloping  action  is  fragmentary ;  it  is 
but  a  small  arc  of  a  circle  extending  beyond  the  field  of  view. 
Even  in  the  special  type  of  dramas  called  histories,  where  the 
enveloping  action  predominates  over  all  the  rest  of  the  plot,  the 
limits  of  a  single  drama  are  too  strait  to  comprehend  the  large 
unity  that  belongs  to  history ;  other  forms  of  dramatic  interest 
obtain  here,  such  as  the  notoriety  of  the  incidents  presented,  and 
their  appeal  to  the  instinct  of  patriotism.  But  the  question 
naturally  presents  itself :  If  a  larger  arc  of  the  circle  were  presented, 
if  a  sufficiently  wide  range  of  national  life  could  be  dramatically 
treated,  then  might  not  history  catch  the  completeness  of  story, 
and  great  historic  principles  be  seen  to  emerge  ? 

It  is  obvious  that  there  are  good  materials  for  the  consideration 
of  this  question  in  the  plays  of  Shakespeare  which  treat  the  history 
of  England.  They  are  ten  in  number ;  eight  of  the  ten  are  con- 
tinuous, or  at  least  named  after  successive  reigns ;  the  other  two 
are  indeed  separated  from  the  continuous  succession,  but  in  a  way 
which  naturally  invites  the  suggestion  so  often  made,  that  they 
constitute   a  prologue  and  an  epilogue  to  the  double  tetralogy. 

269 


2/0  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

We  are  deterred,  it  is  true,  from  expecting  much  in  the  way  of 
sustained  plan  by  the  mode  in  which  the  plays  were  produced ; 
the  later  tetralogy  was  composed  before  the  earlier;  moreover, 
in  the  three  parts  of  Henry  the  Sixth  indications  of  collaboration, 
and  the  working  over  of  other  materials,  are  specially  clear.  But  here, 
as  always,  the  question  is  not  of  an  author  and  a  conscious  plan. 
These  dramas  stage  English  history,  as  other  plays  stage  romance 
stories.  The  real  question  is,  whether  the  conception  of  history 
betrayed  in  this  succession  of  plays  is  resolvable  into  anything 
that  can  be  called  law  or  principle. 

To  me  it  appears  that  we  must  answer  this  question  in  the 
affirmative.  A  certain  principle  of  history,  simple  yet  highly 
impressive,  appears  dramatically  enunciated  in  the  prologue  play, 
worked  over  on  the  largest  scale  in  the  succession  of  eight 
historic  dramas,  and  recast  with  a  striking  variation  in  the  play 
which  serves  as  epilogue.  The  principle  is  best  expressed  in 
metaphorical  language :  it  is  the  pendulum  swing  of  events  be- 
tween one  and  the  other  of  two  rival  interests ;  a  deep-seated 
alternation  in  the  natural  course  of  things.  Such  a  principle  needs, 
however,  a  corollary.  If  the  general  movement  is  to  be  a  pendu- 
lum-like alternation,  this  will  be  the  more  impressive  dramatically  if 
it  is  broken  at  intervals  by  what  appears  hke  a  position  of  rest : 
not  rest  in  the  negative  sense,  —  as  if  the  alternation  at  that  point 
was  merely  not  perceptible,  —  but  a  peculiar,  striking,  exceptional 
evenness  between  things  which  before  and  after  are  seen  rising  and 
faUing.  Or  it  may  be  that  there  is  a  pause  to  gather  in  fresh 
material,  which  is  itself  presently  to  become  the  subject  of  rapid 
mutation.  This  then  is  the  nature  of  the  movement  I  am  seeking 
in  this  chapter  to  trace  through  the  succession  of  historic  plays ; 
a  persistent  swing  in  the  course  of  history  to  and  fro,  broken  by 
parentheses  of  emphasised  rest,  or  other  preparation  for  fresh 
alternation. 

It  is  the  play  of  King  John  which  serves  as  prologue  for  the 
histioric  succession.      Here  we  have  very  clearly  marked  the  two 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  2/1 

interests  between  which  the  movement  of  the  plot  is  to  alternate. 
England  and  France  are  throughout  Shakespeare  treated  as  rival 
countries ;  the  rivalry  in  the  present  case  is  enhanced  by  a  double 
claim  to  the  English  crown ;  France  has  backed  the  cause  of  young 
Arthur,  while  John  has  his  claim  supported  by  the  strong  argument 
of  possession.  Yet  other  forces  are  added  to  both  sides,  to  make 
the  scale  more  even.  Feminine  influence  is  strong  for  either 
cause ;  the  passionate  young  motherhood  of  Constance  is  a 
bulwark  for  Arthur ;  the  queen  mother  EHnor  brings  to  John  the 
strength  of  maturity  and  poUtical  capacity.  Again,  France  has  an 
ally,  the  Duke  of  Austria,  who  appears  always  in  his  robe  of  lion's 
skin,  in  token  of  the  proud  feat  by  which  he  held  prisoner  the 
magnificent  Cceur-de-lion ;  naturally  he  is  the  enemy  of  the  King 
who  is  his  prisoner's  brother.  On  the  other  hand  the  Enghsh  army 
contains  Faulconbridge,  bastard  son  of  this  Coeur-de-lion,  whose 
rude  humour  loses  no  opportunity  of  mocking  the  lion- like  preten- 
sions of  Austria,  while  his  rough  valour  eventually  brings  the  boaster 
to  his  doom.  Between  these  evenly  balanced  interests  —  England 
with  its  allies,  France  with  its  allies — the  pendulum  of  fortune  is 
to  be  seen  swinging.^ 

But,  as  we  have  seen,  the  alternation  will  be  the  more  dramati- 
cally impressive  if  the  movement  can  start  in  some  evenness  of 
poise  between  the  interests  that  are  afterwards  to  rise  and  fall. 
This  is  secured  by  the  curious  incident  of  Anglers,  which  occupies 
the  second  act  of  the  play.  This  Anglers  is  a  fortified  city  in 
that  part  of  the  land  of  France  which  at  the  period  of  the  play 
was  an  appanage  of  the  English  crown.  The  French  King  has 
begun  the  war  against  John  by  besieging  this  place ;  his  ally  and 
the  French  court  are  with  him  in  the  field.  And  it  is  here  that 
King  John,  with  his  court  and  his  army  of  invasion,  encounters 
his  rival.  First,  there  is  a  discussion  of  rights  and  claims  between 
the  two  courts,  feminine  bitterness   and  rough   humour  bearing 


1  For  dividing  points  and  exact  references  compare  the  scheme  of  King  John  in 
the  Appendix  below,  page  365. 


2^2  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

their  part  in  the  dialogue.  Words  proving  vain,  both  armies  turn 
to  force,  and  the  city  is  summoned  with  blast  of  trumpet. 

First  at.  Who  is  it  that  hath  warn'd  us  to  the  walls? 

King  Philip.     'Tis  France,  for  England. 

King  John.  England,  for  itself. 

You  men  of  Angiers,  and  my  loving  subjects,  — 
King  Philip.     You  loving  men  of  Angiers,  Arthur's  subjects, 

Our  trumpet  call'd  you  to  this  gentle  parle,  — 
King  John.       For  our  advantage  ;  therefore  hear  us  first. 

Oratory  follows  from  both  kings,  but  the  good  burghers  have  a 
plain  answer. 

First  at.  In  brief,  we  are  the  King  of  England's  subjects ; 

For  him,  and  in  his  right,  we  hold  this  town. 

King  John.       Acknowledge  then  the  king,  and  let  me  in. 

First  at.  That  can  we  not ;  but  he  that  proves  the  king. 

To  him  will  we  prove  loyal :  till  that  time 
Have  we  ramm'd  up  our  gates  against  the  world. 

The  citizens  of  Angiers  have  exactly  anticipated  the  spirit  of  the 
future  Jacobite  toast : 

God  bless  the  King ;  God  bless  our  faith's  defender ; 
God  bless  —  no  harm  in  blessing  —  the  Pretender : 
But  who  Pretender  is,  and  who  is  King, 
God  bless  us  all,  that's  quite  another  thing. 

There  is  nothing  to  be  done  except  that  the  two  parties  determine 
their  claims  by  force.  With  the  stage  symbol  of  alarums  and  ex- 
cursions a  battle  is  indicated,  and  then  summons  is  renewed  :  the 
French  herald  declaring  that  victory  plays  upon  the  dancing 
banners  of  the  French ;  his  rival  of  England  proclaiming  with 
equal  confidence  King  John  commander  of  this  hot  mahcious  day. 
But  the  burghers  have  been  watching  from  the  walls,  and  know 
the  facts. 

Blood  hath  bought  blood  and  blows  have  answer'd  blows ; 
Strength  match'd  with  strength,  and  power  confronted  power : 
and  both  alike  we  like. 


THE   PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  273 

One  must  prove  greatest :  while  they  weigh  so  even, 
We  hold  our  town  for  neither,  yet  for  both. 

Nothing  could  emphasise  more  dramatically  the  even  poise  of  the 
scales  in  which  England  and  France  are  being  weighed  than  the 
possibility  of  a  single  city  thus  defying  three  potentates  and  their 
armies.  Faulconbridge  catches  the  situation,  and  asks  why  the 
rival  kings  let  "  these  scroyles  of  Anglers  "  flout  them,  and  why 
they  do  not  unite  their  forces  to  level  the  insolent  fort  to  the 
ground,  and  afterwards  fight  out  their  own  quarrel.  The  counsel 
suits  the  spirit  of  the  times ;  there  is  a  movement  for  carrying  it 
into  effect,  when  the  citizens  feel  the  peril  of  their  position,  and 
meet  the  crisis  with  a  proposal  of  their  own.  In  parley  with  the 
kings  they  point  to  two  youthful  figures  in  the  rival  courts,  the 
French  Dauphin,  and  Blanch,  niece  of  the  English  King. 

He  is  the  half  part  of  a  blessed  man, 
Left  to  be  finished  by  such  as  she ; 
And  she  a  fair  divided  excellence, 
Whose  fulness  of  perfection  lies  in  him. 

In  pompous  oratory  it  is  suggested  that  a  union  of  these  two  per- 
sons would  heal  the  breach  between  two  kingdoms,  and  be  more 
powerful  than  cannon  to  open  the  fortress  gates.  The  policy  of 
such  a  match  attracts  the  elders  ;  youth  and  beauty  work  upon  the 
parties  concerned ;  the  project  gains  ground,  and  articles  of  treaty 
are  discussed.  The  evenly  balanced  conflict  has  ended  in  com- 
promise, Faulconbridge  alone  catching  the  humour  of  the  situation  : 
that  King  John  to  bar  a  title  to  the  whole  has  voluntarily  sur- 
rendered a  part,  while  the  champion  of  conscience  has  exchanged  a 
holy  war  for  a  vile  peace,  all  through  that  great  bias  of  the  world 
—  Commodity  ! 

Now  it  is  precisely  with  this  proposal  from  the  men  of  Anglers 
that  the  peculiar  movement  of  the  play  has  started  from  its  posi- 
tion of  rest.  Up  to  this  point,  all  has  gone  to  emphasise  the  even 
balance  of  the  two  parties ;  when  this  compromise  has  been 
accepted,  we  have  the  whole  power  of  England,  of  France,  of 


2/4  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Austria,  concentrated  on  one  side,  while  on  the  other  side  young 
Arthur  is  left  helpless  and  alone.  It  is  in  vain  that  they  talk  to 
Constance  of  the  blessedness  of  peace,  and  declare  that  the  day 
which  has  brought  it  shall  be  a  perpetual  holiday. 

Constance.    A  wicked  day,  and  not  a  holy  day! 

What  hath  this  day  deserved  ?     What  hath  it  done, 
That  it  in  golden  letters  should  be  set 
Among  the  high  tides  in  the  calendar? 
Nay,  rather  turn  this  day  out  of  the  week. 
This  day  of  shame,  oppression,  perjury. 
Or,  if  it  must  stand  still,  let  wives  with  child 
Pray  that  their  burthens  may  not  fall  this  day, 
Lest  that  their  hopes  prodigiously  be  crossed ; 
But  on  this  day  let  seamen  fear  no  wreck  ; 
No  bargains  break  that  are  not  this  day  made : 
This  day,  all  things  begun  come  to  ill  end. 
Yea,  faith  itself  to  hollow  falsehood  change! 

The  passion  of  Constance  is  the  precise  measure  of  the  degree  to 
which  the  pendulum  of  fortune  has  swung  to  the  side  opposed  to 
Arthur.  Yet  it  is  in  the  midst  of  this  scene  of  bitterness  between 
Arthur's  mother  and  her  former  allies  that  a  diversion  takes  place, 
and,  in  reality,  the  sway  of  movement  has  begun  to  turn  in  an 
opposite  direction. 

The  diversion  has  been  made  by  the  entrance  of  the  papal 
legate  :  on  his  way  to  England  he  has  met  its  king  in  company 
with  the  King  of  France.  In  presence  of  the  two  monarchs  and 
their  courts  the  legate  blurts  out  certain  demands  respecting 
quarrels  between  the  English  crown  and  primate.  John  is  repre- 
sented in  this  drama  as  the  mouthpiece  of  England's  antagonism 
to  papal  pretensions. 

John.    What  earthly  name  to  interrogatories 

Can  task  the  free  breath  of  a  sacred  king? 

When  Philip  is  shocked  at  resistance  to  Holy  Church,  John  speaks 
with  more  and  more  of  defiance,  until  the  legate  thunders  excom- 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  2/5 

munication,  and  King  Philip  is  commanded  to  loose  the  hand  of  an 
arch-heretic.  It  had  happened  that  the  papal  legate  entered  at  the 
very  moment  in  which  the  two  kings  by  a  ceremonious  hand-clasp 
were  signifying  their  new  peace  and  alliance  :  round  that  hand-clasp 
a  great  contest  now  wages  —  Pandulph  against  John,  Constance 
against  Elinor,  Austria  against  Faulconbridge ;  the  newly  pledged 
lover  and  his  prospective  bride  take  opposite  sides.  Arguments  as 
to  the  sacredness  of  peace  and  treaty  faith  seem  vain. 

Pandulph.    All  form  is  formless,  order  orderless, 

Save  what  is  opposite  to  England's  love. 

The  conflict  extends  to  the  very  verge  of  excommunication  against 
Philip  :  only  then  does  he  yield. 

Pandulph,  I  will  denounce  a  curse  upon  his  head. 

King  Philip.  Thou  shalt  not  need.     England,  I  will  fall  from  thee. 

Constance.  O  fair  return  of  banish'd  majesty ! 

Elinor.  O  foul  revolt  of  French  inconstancy  ! 

The  loosing  of  this  hand-clasp  has  symbolised  a  swing  of  the 
pendulum  from  one  extreme  to  the  very  opposite  :  a  moment 
before  Arthur  was  alone,  and  all  power  massed  on  the  side  of 
John  j  by  this  change  we  see  the  whole  strength  of  France  and 
Austria  transferred  to  the  support  of  Arthur,  with  the  addition  of 
the  spiritual  power  of  Rome  and  Holy  Church,  while  John  must 
face  this  vast  combination  without  a  single  ally. 

There  is  another  turning-point,  and  the  pendulum  swings  back. 
This  time  it  is  by  *  the  fortune  of  war ' :  providence  is  not  always 
on  the  side  of  the  big  battalions,  and,  though  France,  Austria,  and 
Rome  are  all  against  England,  in  the  actual  fight  it  is  England 
that  wins.  A  roaring  tempest  shatters  the  French  fleet;  their 
armies  are  disgracefully  defeated  in  the  field  \  the  Duke  of  Austria 
is  slain  in  battle  by  Faulconbridge.  This  Faulconbridge,  as  a  man 
not  likely  to  be  frightened  by  bell,  book,  and  candle,  is  sent  to 
England  to  seize  the  wealth  of  the  Church. — 


2/6  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Ere  our  coming,  see  thou  shake  the  bags 
Of  hoarding  abbots  ;  imprisoned  angels 
Set  at  liberty :  the  fat  ribs  of  peace 
Must  by  the  hungry  now  be  fed  upon. 

More  than  all  this :  little  Arthur  is  taken  prisoner  by  John,  and 
given  into  the  sure  custody  of  Hubert.  Reversal  of  fortune  could 
not  be  more  complete  :  Constance  appears  before  us  — 

a  grave  unto  a  soul ; 
Holding  the  eternal  spirit,  against  her  will, 
In  the  vile  prison  of  afflicted  breath. 

Even  the  Dauphin  of  France  finds  life  not  worth  living  : 

Life  is  as  tedious  as  a  twice-told  tale 
Vexing  the  dull  ear  of  a  drowsy  man. 

Now,  it  is  just  at  the  close  of  this  speech  of  the  Dauphin  that 
one  more  turning-point  of  the  plot  must  be  placed  ;  the  pendulum 
of  events  prepares  to  swing  again  from  one  extreme  to  the  op- 
posite. This  time  the  change  comes  through  that  hidden  force 
in  things  we  call  '  reaction ' :  the  sagacious  legate  sees  how  the 
very  completeness  of  John's  good  fortune  will  make  him  reckless 
and  unscrupulous ;  something  will  happen  to  Arthur,  there  will  be 
a  revulsion  of  feeling  in  England  against  the  evil  King,  and  the 
French  prince  may  claim  the  crown  by  virtue  of  his  marriage  with 
Lady  Blanch.  And  events  turn  out  precisely  as  Pandulph  prophe- 
sies. The  fourth  act  is  filled  with  dramatic  interest  of  detail, 
especially  with  reference  to  the  character  of  Hubert  as  a  man  of 
mystery,  who  plays  a  deeper  part  than  appears  on  the  surface. 
But  the  drift  of  this  act  in  the  general  plot  is  to  present  Arthur 
dead,  the  blame  of  it  fixed  by  the  national  voice  on  the  King,  the 
French  invading  in  force,  and  the  Enghsh  nobles  —  who  constitute 
the  military  force  of  the  country  —  deserting  in  mass  to  the  enemy. 
John  is  left  helpless,  with  a  hostile  people  behind  him,  and  in 
front  an  enemy  already  landed  on  his  shores. 

An  adroit  device  of  a  desperate  man  makes  another  turning- 


THE   PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  277 

point,  and  introduces  one  more  reversal  of  the  scale  of  fortune. 
In  flat  contradiction  to  his  late  position  as  representative  of  na- 
tional independence,  King  John  in  this  extremity  surrenders  his 
crown  to  Rome,  and,  at  the  opening  of  the  fifth  act,  is  seen  receiv- 
ing it  back  as  Rome's  vassal.  Thus  one  powerful  element  of  the 
combination  against  him  is  not  only  removed,  but  transferred  to 
King  John's  side. 

Pandulph.   It  was  my  breath  that  blew  this  tempest  up, 
Upon  your  stubborn  usage  of  the  pope ; 
But  since  you  are  a  gentle  convertite, 
My  tongue  shall  hush  again  this  storm  of  war, 
And  make  fair  weather  in  your  blustering  land. 

Of  course,  the  invading  prince  of  France  resents  thus  being  made 
a  puppet  of  Roman  diplomacy.  But  meanwhile  Faulconbridge, 
embodying  the  patriotic  spirit  which  repels  invasion  under  any 
pretext,  has  raised  a  powerful  force  to  confi-ont  Lewis.  Provi- 
dence takes  the  English  side,  and  the  French  reinforcements  are 
wrecked  on  the  Goodwin  sands.  More  strange  still :  a  dying 
nobleman  of  the  French  army  reveals  to  the  EngHsh  a  treacherous 
plot  against  the  nobles  who  had  deserted  to  France. 

Fly,  noble  English,  you  are  bought  and  sold ; 
Unthread  the  rude  eye  of  rebellion 
And  welcome  home  again  discarded  faith. 
Seek  out  King  John  and  fall  before  his  feet ; 
For  if  the  French  be  lords  of  this  loud  day, 
He  means  to  recompense  the  pains  you  take 
By  cutting  off  your  heads  :  thus  hath  he  sworn 
And  I  with  him,  and  many  moe  with  me, 
Upon  the  altar  at  Saint  Edmundsbury ; 
Even  on  that  altar  where  we  swore  to  you 
Dear  amity  and  everlasting  love.  .  .  . 
Commend  me  to  one  Hubert  with  your  King : 
The  love  of  him,  and  this  respect  besides, 
For  that  my  grandsire  was  an  Englishman, 
Awakes  my  conscience  to  confess  all  this. 


278  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Thus  at  this  point  it  is  the  representative  of  France  who  is  de- 
feated, deserted,  and  helpless,  and  all  power  has  gravitated  to  the 
English  side. 

Yet  the  course  of  events  dramatised  in  this  play  is  to  see  just 
one  more  swing  of  the  pendulum.  King  John,  victorious  against 
the  French  and  in  the  restored  allegiance  of  his  nobles,  is  suddenly 
conscious  that  he  is  doomed  never  to  reap  the  fruits  of  victory. 

Poison'd,  —  ill  fare,  —  dead,  forsook,  cast  off: 

And  none  of  you  will  bid  the  winter  come 

To  thrust  his  icy  fingers  in  my  maw. 

Nor  let  my  kingdom's  rivers  take  their  course 

Through  my  burn'd  bosom,  nor  entreat  the  north 

To  make  his  bleak  winds  kiss  my  parched  lips 

And  comfort  me  with  cold. 

As  Faulconbridge  enters,  the  King  rallies  his  strength  to  hear  the 
news  he  brings. 

The  tackle  of  my  heart  is  crack'd  and  burn'd, 
And  all  the  shrouds  wherewith  my  life  should  sail 
Are  turned  to  one  thread,  one  little  hair : 
My  heart  hath  one  poor  string  to  stay  it  by, 
Which  holds  but  till  thy  news  be  uttered. 

The  news  Faulconbridge  brings  is  that  the  forces  he  was  leading 
to  meet  fresh  advance  of  the  Dauphin  have  been  overpowered  by 
a  flood  as  the  Wash  was  being  crossed.  At  the  shock  of  this  loss 
the  King  dies,  and  the  pendulum  swing  of  the  plot  ceases.  It 
only  remains  for  the  papal  legate  to  make  peace  between  the 
countries,  and  Henry  reigns  in  his  father's  stead. 

To  the  modern  reader  Shakespeare's  dramatisation  of  the  reign 
of  King  John  comes  as  a  surprise.  There  is  not  a  hint  of  what 
we  are  accustomed  to  consider  as  the  characteristic  of  that  reign, 
making  it  the  most  critical  period  of  English  history  ;  on  the  other 
hand,  what  would  seem  matter  of  inferior  moment  is  treated  with 
fine  workmanship  and  dramatic  vigour.  The  explanation  is  easy,  if 
this  play  is  to  stand  as  prologue  to  the  succession  of  histories,  and 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  279 

if  the  spirit  of  history,  as  conceived  by  Elizabethan  dramatists, 
consisted  in  the  pendulum-hke  alternation  of  fortune.  Nowhere 
else  do  we  find  the  rival  interests  so  evenly  balanced,  nor  the 
balance  so  constantly  emphasised ;  nowhere  else  do  we  see  such 
sharp  turns  in  events,  and  such  great  mutations  realised  in  such 
brief  intervals.  Moreover  the  whole  of  this  manifold  alternation 
is  within  the  hmits  of  a  single  play,  and  centres  around  the  single 
personality  of  King  John. 

It  is  different  as  we  pass  on  :  we  now  have  a  succession  of  eight 
dramas  making  a  connected  whole ;  the  longer  period  is  fit  for 
the  larger  life  of  history.  The  two  interests  between  which  fortune 
is  to  alternate  remain  substantially  the  same  throughout.  On  the 
one  side  we  have  the  crown;  on  the  other  side  we  see,  now 
domestic  sedition,  now  foreign  war,  until  the  two  elements  seem 
to  unite  as  court  factions  grow  into  the  fully  developed  Wars  of 
the  Roses.  Of  course,  in  the  several  plays  which  make  up  the 
series  there  is  much  beside  this  main  interest  of  historic  action 
and  reaction.  In  King  John  we  have  had  the  characters  of  Faul- 
conbridge,  of  Hubert  and  Arthur;  in  later  plays  we  have  the 
personalities  of  a  Hotspur  and  a  Glendower ;  the  Falstaff  under- 
plot in  the  two  parts  of  Henry  the  Fourth  throws  the  historic 
interest  into  the  shade.  And  further,  if  we  divide  the  eight  plays 
into  two  tetralogies,  we  get  (as  earher  chapters  of  this  book  have 
pointed  out)  a  rise  throughout  the  three  plays  of  the  interest 
which  is  to  dominate  the  fourth :  a  rise  of  Henry  Prince  of  Wales 
into  the  ideal  heroism  of  Henry  the  Fifths  a  steady  development 
of  Gloucester  into  the  ideal  villany  that  is  to  be  the  note  of 
Richard  the  Third.  But  the  link  of  continuity  which  binds  the 
eight  plays  into  a  whole  is  this  alternation,  stretching  from  play  to 
play,  between  the  royal  power  and  its  domestic  and  foreign  foes. 

If  a  position  of  rest  is  wanted  as  a  starting-point  for  a  move- 
ment of  alternation,  we  find  it  surely  in  that  strange  sentiment  of 
the  divine  right  of  kings,  which  more  or  less  obtains  throughout 
Shakespeare's  treatment  of  English  history,  but  in  the  play  of 


280  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Richard  the  Second  stands  out  in  high  relief  from  contrast  with 
the  King  who  represents  it.  To  Richard  the  sacred  authority  of 
the  crown  seems  valuable  only  as  a  means  of  supply  for  the  ex- 
pensive vices  he  displays  in  company  with  his  creatures. 

Gaunt.   This  royal  throne  of  kings,  this  scepter'd  isle, 
This  earth  of  majesty,  this  seat  of  Mars, 
This  other  Eden,  demi-paradise. 
This  fortress  built  by  Nature  for  herself 
Against  infection  and  the  hand  of  war ; 
This  happy  breed  of  men,  this  little  world, 
This  precious  stone  set  in  the  silver  sea  .  .  . 
Is  now  leased  out,  I  die  pronouncing  it, 
Like  to  a  tenement  or  pelting  farm. 

Frivolity  sits  upon  the  throne  :  none  the  less  gravity  bows  down 
in  pious  submission.  From  this  height  of  divinely  constituted 
authority  the  sway  of  events  is  seen  bringing  the  royal  power 
down  to  the  depths.  The  turning-point  is  dramatically  marked.^ 
Richard  has  been  delayed  in  Ireland  by  contrary  winds,  all  the 
while  that  in  England  rebellion  has  been  gathering  head.  At  last 
he  lands,  and  fondles  with  his  hand  the  soil  of  his  kingdom,  safe 
now  its  rightful  ruler  has  returned. 

Not  all  the  water  in  the  rough  rude  sea 

Can  wash  the  balm  off  from  an  anointed  king ; 

The  breath  of  worldly  men  cannot  depose 

The  deputy  elected  by  the  Lord  : 

For  every  man  that  Bolingbroke  hath  press'd 

To  lift  shrewd  steel  against  our  golden  crown, 

God  for  his  Richard  hath  in  heavenly  pay 

A  glorious  angel :  then,  if  angels  fight. 

Weak  men  must  fall,  for  heaven  still  guards  the  right. 

From  these  very  words  Richard  turns  to  meet  the  first  of  a  string 
of  messengers  bearing  news  of  delay,  of  dispersion,  of  death,  till 
further  inquiry  becomes  useless. 

1  For  divisions  and  exact  references  throughout  this  chapter,  see  scheme  of  the 
historic  plays  in  the  Appendix  below,  pages  365-369. 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  28 1 

Aumerle.  Where  is  the  duke  my  father  with  his  power? 

King  Richard.   No  matter  where ;  of  comfort  no  man  speak : 
Let's  talk  of  graves,  of  worms  and  epitaphs  ; 
Make  dust  our  paper  and  with  rainy  eyes 
Write  sorrow  on  the  bosom  of  the  earth. 
Lef  s  choose  executors  and  talk  of  wills  : 
And  yet  not  so,  for  what  can  we  bequeath 
Save  our  deposed  bodies  to  the  ground  ? 
Our  lands,  our  lives  and  all  are  Bolingbroke's, 
And  nothing  can  we  call  our  own  but  death, 
And  that  small  model  of  the  barren  earth 
Which  serves  as  paste  and  cover  to  our  bones. 

This  passage  stands  but  at  the  centre  of  the  play ;  yet  all  the  rest 
is  no  more  than  the  swing  downward  from  exalted  kingship  to 
humiliation,  deposition,  imprisonment,  murder ;  the  swing  upward 
of  Bolingbroke,  who  entered  England  humbly  claiming  the  prop- 
erty of  his  deceased  father,  to  the  throne  vacated  by  Richard. 

In  the  plays  treating  the  reign  of  Henry  the  Fourth  the  historic 
alternation  is  seen  to  have  recommenced.  The  power  which 
hurled  Richard  from  kingship  was  Bolingbroke  in  alliance  with 
Northumberland  :  Bolingbroke's  was  the  rival  title  to  the  throne, 
Northumberland  was  the  influence  to  bring  round  the  English 
nobles  and  lead  the  revolution.  As  the  first  part  of  Henry  the 
Fourth  opens  we  see  these  firm  allies  separated  :  King  Boling- 
broke has  sunk  from  security  to  the  necessity  of  meeting  factious 
uprisings  in  all  parts  of  his  dominions,  and  the  link  that  binds  all 
these  rebel  factions  together  is  Northumberland.  Hotspur,  the 
warrior  of  the  rebellion,  is  Northumberland's  son;  his  brother 
Worcester  is  its  statesman ;  family  ties  connect  the  house  of 
Northumberland  with  Wales,  and  bring  the  mighty  Welsh  ma- 
gician Glendower  to  aid  the  cause;  the  Percies,  moreover,  in 
their  period  of  loyalty,  had  made  conquests  in  Scotland,  and, 
turning  rebels,  can  by  restoring  prisoners  win  Douglas  and  the 
Scotch  to  their  side.  To  so  low  a  point  has  the  royal  power 
declined  in  contrast  with  rising  rebellion,  that  the  chief  concern 
of  the  revolting   leaders  is  how  they  shall  divide   the  country 


282  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

between  themselves.  A  well-known  speech  of  the  King  not  only 
recognises  Northumberland  as  the  focus  of  this  widespread  sedi- 
tion, but  is  further  important  as  giving  expression,  in  the  midst 
of  the  shifting  incidents,  to  the  thought  of  alternating  fortunes 
as  the  law  of  national  history.^ 

O  God !  that  one  might  read  the  book  of  fate, 

And  see  the  revolution  of  the  times 

Make  mountains  level,  and  the  continent, 

Weary  of  solid  firmness,  melt  itself 

Into  the  sea !  and,  other  times,  to  see 

The  beachy  girdle  of  the  ocean 

Too  wide  for  Neptune's  hips ;  how  chances  mock, 

And  changes  fill  the  cup  of  alteration 

With  divers  liquors  !     O,  if  this  were  seen, 

The  happiest  youth,  viewing  his  progress  through. 

What  perils  past,  what  crosses  to  ensue, 

Would  shut  the  book,  and  sit  him  down  and  die. 

'Tis  not  ten  years  gone 

Since  Richard  and  Northumberland,  great  friends, 

Did  feast  together,  and  in  two  years  after 

Were  they  at  wars :  it  is  but  eight  years  since 

This  Percy  was  the  man  nearest  my  soul, 

Who  like  a  brother  toil'd  in  my  affairs 

And  laid  his  love  and  life  under  my  foot, 

Yea,  for  my  sake,  even  to  the  eyes  of  Richard 

Gave  him  defiance.     But  which  of  you  was  by  — 

You,  cousin  Nevil,  as  I  may  remember  — 

When  Richard,  with  his  eye  brimful  of  tears, 

Then  check'd  and  rated  by  Northumberland, 

Did  speak  these  words,  now  proved  a  prophecy  ? 

*  Northumberland,  thou  ladder  by  the  which 

My  cousin  Bolingbroke  ascends  my  throne; '  .  .  . 

*  The  time  shall  come,'  thus  did  he  follow  it, 

<The  time  will  come,  that  foul  sin,  gathering  head,    . 
Shall  break  into  corruption ' :  so  went  on. 
Foretelling  this  same  time's  condition, 
And  the  division  of  our  amity. 

1  //  Henry  the  Fourth  .•  III.  I.  45. 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  283 

Northumberland  is  the  one  link  binding  the  scattered  rebellions 
into  a  unity  of  strength :  the  hesitation  and  weakness  of  North- 
umberland dissolves  this  unity.  Irresistible  as  a  whole,  the 
rebels  are  defeated  piecemeal,  and  the  pendulum  of  fortune  is 
seen  to  have  moved  to  the  side  of  royal  power.  Passage  after 
passage  marks  the  critical  position  of  Northumberland  in  the 
plot.^  Meanwhile,  this  man  upon  whom  everything  depends  is 
exhibited  before  us  in  the  bosom  of  his  family,  distracted  by 
doubts. 
Northumberland.  'Tis  with  my  mind 

As  with  the  tide  sweird  up  unto  his  height, 
That  makes  a  still-stand,  running  neither  way : 
Fain  would  I  go  to  meet  the  archbishop, 
But  many  thousand  reasons  hold  me  back. 
I  will  resolve  for  Scotland. ^ 

The  temporising  policy  of  Northumberland  paralyses  his  alHes; 
one  after  another  the  separated  forces  of  revolt  are  wiped  out, 
until  Westmoreland  can  say  to  the  King  in  his  palace  — 

There  is  not  now  a  rebel's  sword  unsheath'd. 

Fortune  has  swung  to  the  full  height  of  exaltation  for  the  king; 
in  an  instant  it  swings  back  again,  for  the  shock  of  good  news 
brings  on  apoplexy. 

King.    And  wherefore  should  these  good  news  make  me  sick? 
Will  Fortune  never  come  with  both  hands  full, 
But  write  her  fair  words  still  in  foulest  letters? 
She  either  gives  a  stomach  and  no  food ; 
Such  are  the  poor,  in  health  ;  or  else  a  feast, 
And  takes  away  the  stomach ;  such  are  the  rich, 
That  have  abundance  and  enjoy  it  not. 
I  should  rejoice  now  at  this  happy  news ; 
And  now  my  sight  fails,  and  my  brain  is  giddy : 
O  me!  come  near  me ;  now  I  am  much  ill. 

1  E.g.  I  Henry  the  Fourth:  II.  iii.  init.;  IV.  i.  13-85;  IV.  iv,  from  13;  II  Henry 
the  Fourth  :  I.  i.  163;  I.  iii,  from  10. 

2  //  Henry  the  Fourth  :  W.  iii.  62. 


284  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

From  the  triumphant  scene  of  his  long-delayed  success  the  King 
is  carried  to  die. 

We  now  reach,  in  the  play  of  Henry  the  Fifth,  one  of  those 
breaks  in  the  mutations  of  fortune,  which,  we  have  seen,  are  an 
essential  feature  in  the  movement  of  history  as  conceived  by 
Shakespeare.  The  starting-point  for  the  oscillation  between  royal 
power  and  sedition  was  found  in  the  divinity  of  kingship :  the 
presentation  of  a  kingly  personality  makes  a  central  stage  of  rest. 
A  former  chapter  of  this  book  has  dwelt  upon  the  way  in  which 
Shakespeare  reads  into  the  character  of  Henry  of  Monmouth  a 
combination  of  all  elements  making  supreme  heroism ;  under 
heroic  rule  like  this  resistance  to  royal  power  appears  only  to 
display  its  own  weakness.  Before  this  we  have  seen  sedition 
taking  local  colour  from  all  parts  of  the  king's  dominions :  we 
have  had  Glendower  and  Welsh,  Douglas  and  Scotch,  the  Percies 
and  EngUsh  revolt;  in  King  John  we  have  heard  of  rebels  in 
Ireland.  But  it  is  a  distinctive  note  in  the  French  war  of  Henry 
the  Fifth  that  all  the  component  elements  of  Great  Britain  are 
represented;  one  hne  of  action  in  the  underplot  is  made  by 
EngUsh  officers  and  men  led  by  Cower,  Welsh  officers  led 
by  Fluellen,  Scotch  by  Jamy,  Irish  by  MacMorris,  all  blending 
together  into  a  pageant  of  military  Hfe. 

We  pass  on,  and  the  swing  of  fortune  is  resumed,  and  main- 
tained through  the  three  parts  of  Henry  the  Sixth.  Rest  is  still 
used  as  a  contrast  to  motion,  but  in  a  different  way ;  instead  of 
intervals  of  repose,  making  breathing  spaces  in  a  long-sustained 
movement  of  alternation,  we  here  have  the  element  of  rest  main- 
tained continuously  as  a  background,  against  which  the  rising  and 
falling  vicissitudes  stand  out  in  relief.  This  element  of  repose  is 
the  King  himself.  We  have  had  divinity  of  kingship  and  kingly 
personaHty  :  in  the  present  case  we  have  unkingly  kingship.  The 
spirit  of  Henry  is  the  devout  ideal  of  the  quiet  cloister,  ever  in 
antagonism  with  the  turmoil  of  public  life.  In  a  lonely  spot 
adjoining  a  battlefield  of  civil  war,  on  which  son  is  killing  father 
and  father  son,  Henry  meditates.^  — 

1///  Henry  the  Sixth :  II.  v.  20. 


THE  PENDULUM  OF   HISTORY  28$ 

O  God  !  methinks  it  were  a  happy  life, 
To  be  no  better  than  a  homely  swain ; 
To  sit  upon  a  hill,  as  I  do  now, 
To  carve  out  dials  quaintly,  point  by  point, 
Thereby  to  see  the  minutes  how  they  run, 
How  many  make  the  hour  full  complete ; 
How  many  hours  bring  about  the  day ; 
How  many  days  will  finish  up  the  year ; 
How  many  years  a  mortal  man  may  live. 
When  this  is  known,  then  to  divide  the  times : 
So  many  hours  must  I  tend  my  flock ; 
So  many  hours  must  I  take  my  rest ; 
So  many  hours  must  I  contemplate ; 
So  many  hours  must  I  sport  myself; 
So  many  days  my  ewes  have  been  with  young ; 
So  many  days  ere  the  poor  fools  will  ean ; 
So  many  years  ere  I  shall  shear  the  fleece  : 
So  minutes,  hours,  days,  months,  and  years. 
Passed  over  to  the  end  they  were  created, 
Would  bring  white  hairs  unto  a  quiet  grave. 

The  personality  of  Henry  is  before  us  through  three  plays,  symbol 
of  this  reposeful  ideal :  meanwhile,  those  who  rule  in  his  name,  but 
not  in  his  spirit,  are  giving  scope  for  the  ceaseless  mutations  of 
fortune. 

The  first  play  opens  with  the  French  war :  if  we  read  continu- 
ously the  scenes  portraying  this  war  we  may  almost  mark  the 
margin  of  the  book  with  the  crescendo  and  decrescendo  of 
musical  score,  so  regularly  and  rapidly  does  the  pendulum  swing 
between  Enghsh  success  and  failure.  The  funeral  of  Henry  the 
Fifth  is  disturbed  by  messengers  following  on  one  another's 
heels  with  tidings  of  ill :  Guienne,  Champagne,  Rheims,  Orleans, 
Paris,  all  lost ;  the  Dauphin  crowned  in  Rheims,  the  Bastard  of 
Orleans,  the  Dukes  of  Anjou  and  Alengon  supporting  his  cause ; 
and  worse  still,  the  stout  Talbot  treacherously  deserted  and  taken 
prisoner.  As  the  scene  shifts  to  the  seat  of  war  the  worst  for 
England  seems  reahsed  :  Charles  and  his  French  lords  feel  that 
one  more  effort  will  raise  the  siege  of  Orleans. — 


286  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Remaineth  none  but  mad-brain'd  Salisbury ; 
And  he  may  well  in  fretting  spend  his  gall, 
Nor  men  nor  money  hath  he  to  make  war. 

The  battle  is  essayed,  and  at  once  the  sway  of  fortune  has  changed 
in  favour  of  England :  the  Dauphin  is  in  full  retreat,  cursing  his 
dastard  soldiers,  while  Salisbury  now  is  called  a  desperate  homicide 
fighting  as  if  weary  of  Hfe ;  the  French  say  the  English  army  is 
made  up  of  Samsons  and  Goliases,  that  — 

Their  arms  are  set  like  clocks,  still  to  strike  on. 

But  immediately  fortune  turns  again :  the  hopes  of  the  enemy 
rise  as  news  comes  of  the  Holy  Maid,  raised  up  by  miraculous 
vision  to  drive  the  English  from  France.  La  Pucelle  appears, 
easily  foils  the  simple  devices  tried  to  test  her ;  and  French  victory 
is  felt  to  be  assured. 

Glory  is  like  a  circle  in  the  water, 

Which  never  ceaseth  to  enlarge  itself 

Till  by  broad  spreading  it  disperse  to  nought. 

With  Henry's  death  the  English  circle  ends ; 

Dispersed  are  the  glories  it  included. 

But,  to  balance  this,  the  English  side  receives  a  most  valuable 
accession :  in  the  trenches  round  Orleans,  Salisbury  welcomes 
Talbot,  ransomed  from  captivity  after  innumerable  adventures. 
As  the  tale  of  adventure  is  being  told,  fickle  fortune  is  veering  :  a 
gun  carefully  trained  to  cover  the  turret  where  the  two  warriors  are 
speaking  is  touched  at  the  right  moment  by  the  gunner's  boy, 
and  —  woe  for  England  !  —  the  noble  Salisbury  is  shattered  to 
pieces.  There  is  a  cry  that  La  Pucelle  is  approaching  :  the  turns 
of  fate  are  quick :  in  the  vaUant  agony  of  witnessing  the  fall  of 
Sahsbury,  Talbot  drives  the  Dauphin  and  his  French  forces  in 
headlong  flight ;  in  another  moment  it  is  Talbot  who  is  driven 
before  the  French  Maid,  the  old  warrior  bursting  with  spleen, 
giddy  with  whirling  thoughts,  as  his  forces  give  ground  before 
a  woman;  all  is  vain,  the  French  colours  wave  on  the  walls  of 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  287 

Orleans.  Night  settles  down  on  the  French  rejoicings,  to  quench 
them  in  humiliation.  The  English  regent  and  his  ally  of  Burgundy 
approach  with  scaling  ladders ;  the  cry  of  *  St.  George  *  and 
*  a  Talbot '  is  heard,  and  the  French  "  leap  over  the  walls  in  their 
shirts  "  ;  as  the  French  leaders  stand  half  dressed,  with  bundles  of 
clothes  under  their  arms,  mixing  mutual  recriminations  with  plans 
of  rallying,  a  single  unseen  Englishman  raises  the  cry  of  '  Talbot,' 
and  scatters  them  in  flight,  their  clothes  left  behind  as  spoils  for  the 
humorous  soldier.  Another  turn  of  Fortune  ;  this  time  the  fickle 
dame  wears  the  guise  of  courtesy.  English  hopes  seem  to  decline 
as  the  irresistible  Talbot  is  enticed  into  the  castle  of  the  Countess 
of  Auvergne,  on  a  pretext  of  hospitable  admiration  ;  the  admiration 
is  dropped  as  soon  as  her  porter  enters  with  the  keys  of  the  castle, 
and  the  hostess  taunts  Talbot  with  being  her  prisoner. 

Long  time  thy  shadow  had  been  thrall  to  me, 
For  in  my  gallery  thy  picture  hangs  : 
But  now  the  substance  shall  endure  the  like, 
And  I  will  chain  these  legs  and  arms  of  thine. 

The  hopes  of  England  have  risen  again  as  we  hear  the  ringing 
laugh  of  the  great  prisoner. 

No,  no,  I  am  but  shadow  of  myself : 

You  are  deceived,  my  substance  is  not  here ; 

For  what  you  see  is  but  the  smallest  part 

And  least  proportion  of  humanity ; 

I  tell  you,  madam,  were  the  whole  frame  here, 

It  is  of  such  a  spacious  lofty  pitch, 

Your  roof  were  not  sufficient  to  contain  't. 

Talbot  winds  his  horn,  and  from  outside  is  heard  the  drum  and 
thunder  of  artillery :  the  captor  is  at  the  captive's  mercy.  With 
the  scene  shifted  to  Rouen,  the  alternation  of  fate  goes  on.  The 
EngHsh  lose  Rouen,  deceived  by  La  Pucelle's  picturesque  strata- 
gem of  warriors  disguised  as  market  men  with  their  sacks ;  the 
English  recover  Rouen  the  same  day,  with  the  more  than  pictu- 
resque incident  of  the  regent  Bedford,  at  point  of  death,  remaining 


288  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

on  the  scene  in  his  chair,  until  English  victory  gives  him  leisure 
to  die.  One  more  mutation,  in  favour  of  France  :  policy  is  tried 
where  force  has  failed,  and,  as  the  English  forces  march  along  in 
full  strength,  their  indispensable  ally  of  Burgundy  is  detached,  and 
subjected  to  the  inspired  eloquence  of  the  Holy  Maid.  He  is 
bewitched,  relents,  is  vanquished,  will  sever  himself  from  Talbot, 
and  transfer  his  force  to  the  opposite  scale  :  the  third  act  ends 
with  the  swing  of  the  pendulum  wholly  to  the  side  of  EngUsh 
loss. 

The  fourth  act  is  a  parenthesis  in  the  general  movement  of 
alternation.  The  present  play  has  for  its  main  interest  the  French 
war,  the  play  which  follows,  English  sedition :  these  are  re- 
spectively the  fields  in  which  the  pendulum  of  movement  mani- 
fests itself.  This  fourth  act  has  the  function  of  linking  these  two 
things,  war  and  sedition,  into  one.  Single  scenes  scattered  through 
the  series  of  war  pictures  have  displayed  the  factious  rivalry  among 
the  English  nobles  —  Gloucester  against  Winchester,  white  rose 
of  York  against  red  rose  of  Lancaster.  In  the  fourth  act  the  boy 
King,  in  vain  effort  of  reconciliation,  takes  the  unfortunate  step  of 
himself  putting  on  the  red  rose  of  Somerset,  while  he  appoints  the 
rival  Duke  of  York  regent  of  France,  with  Somerset  to  support 
him.  The  consequences  may  be  foreseen.  Talbot  in  desperate 
straits  at  Bourdeaux  appeals  for  succour :  York  lingers  to  lay  the 
blame  on  Somerset,  Somerset  on  York.  What  help  is  secured 
comes  too  late  :  the  siege  of  Bourdeaux  becomes  the  piteous 
tragedy  of  the  two  Talbots,  aged  father  and  young  son,  clasped 
together  in  the  arms  of  death. 

It  remains  for  the  fifth  act  to  present,  most  dramatically,  the 
final  alternation  of  fortune  in  the  war  between  England  and 
France.  The  scene  has  shifted  to  Angiers  ;  outside  its  walls  battle 
is  raging,  and  it  seems  to  be  in  favour  of  England.  The  Holy 
Maid  betakes  herself  to  her  magic. 

Now  help,  ye  charming  spells  and  periapts ; 
And  ye  choice  spirits  that  admonish  me. 
And  give  me  signs  of  future  accidents. 


THE  PENDULUM   OF  HISTORY  289 

Fiends  appear.  She  makes  her  appeal :  they  walk  and  speak 
not.  She  offers  to  lop  off  a  member  of  her  body  :  they  hang  their 
heads.  She  offers  her  body  itself  in  payment  of  their  aid : 
they  shake  their  heads.  Then  she  bids  them  take  her  soul,  if 
only  the  French  may  foil  the  English  :  the  Fiends  vanish,  and 
La  Pucelle  gives  up  hope.  She  is  soon  taken  prisoner,  and  the 
fortunes  of  England  have  risen  above  the  power  of  sorcery  and 
miracle.  But  in  the  very  same  battle  another  woman  is  taken 
prisoner  by  the  English ;  the  seeming  success  in  reality  is  fraught 
with  ruin.  The  prisoner  is  the  Princess  Margaret  of  Anjou, 
whose  beauty  casts  upon  her  captor  Suffolk  a  spell  that  wrecks 
his  life;  the  princess  is  reserved  as  queen  for  Henry,  but  —  by 
strange  reversal  of  marriage  customs  —  a  price  is  to  be  paid  for 
her :  the  price  is  nothing  less  than  the  counties  of  Anjou  and 
Maine,  keys  of  Normandy.  It  is  a  bargain  of  infatuation  :  grizzled 
warriors  weep  that  the  dominion  of  England  in  France  is  irre- 
trievably lost. 

In  the  second  part  of  King  Henry  the  Sixth  sedition  makes  the 
matter  of  the  plot :  in  the  alternate  triumphs  of  hostile  factions 
the  regular  historic  movement  is  to  be  recognised.  Margaret  has 
become  a  force  in  England;  Suffolk  and  Winchester  support  her, 
while  others  rally  around  the  good  Gloucester,  protector  of  the 
realm.  At  first  the  sway  of  fate  is  all  in  favour  of  the  Queen  and 
her  party.  Gloucester  is  struck  at  through  his  wife  ;  the  duchess 
is  insulted  at  court,  and  is  caught  by  spies  in  secret  stances  of 
magic.  Gloucester  is  relieved  of  his  protectorate,  and  accusations 
are  pressed  against  the  retiring  official.  He  is  committed  to  the 
custody  of  his  enemies ;  they  are  led  on  by  factious  hate  to  con- 
trive murder.  In  an  instant  the  pendulum  swings  back  :  through 
a  series  of  picturesque  incidents  we  have  the  wave  of  revulsion 
spreading  high  and  low.  Winchester  dies  in  impenitent  frenzy, 
raving  of  poison  and  murder.  The  King  shudders  at  the  tight  of 
his  lovely  Queen,  and,  strengthened  by  the  riots  of  the  indignant 
commons,  banishes  Suffolk ;  in  his  banishment  he  is  taken  by 
pirates,  and  recognised. — 


290  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Whitmore.  The  Duke  of  Suffolk,  muffled  up  in  rags  ! 
Suffolk,        Ay,  but  these  rags  are  no  part  of  the  duke : 

Jove  sometime  went  disguised,  and  why  not  I  ? 
Captain.       But  Jove  was  never  slain,  as  thou  shalt  be. 

Sedition  again  appears ;  but  its  form  is  entirely  changed  —  it  is 
the  grotesque  popular  rising  of  Jack  Cade,  half  rude  fun,  half 
reckless  bloodshed.  Its  leaders  are  Dick  Butcher,  Smith  the 
Weaver,  a  Sawyer,  a  Tanner;  its  charter  — 

There  shall  be  in  England  seven  halfpenny  loaves  sold  for  a 
penny  ;  the  three-hooped  pot  shall  have  ten  hoops  ;  and  I  will 
make  it  felony  to  drink  small  beer :  all  the  realm  shall  be  in 
common. 

But  the  flood  of  rascality  is  irresistible  in  its  flow :  ordinary  forces 
of  the  king,  noble  warriors,  are  in  turn  overwhelmed  ;  the  tide  has 
reached  Blackheath,  Southwark,  London  Bridge,  Cannon  Street, 
Smithfield.  Even  the  proud  Buckingham  and  Cliff'ord  have  to 
approach  the  rebels  as  ambassadors  from  the  King.  But  this  is 
the  sudden  turn  of  the  tide :  as  the  ambassadors  harangue  and 
Cade  answers,  the  mob  shout  alternately  for  King  and  for  Cade. 

Cade.  Was  ever  feather  so  lightly  blown  to  and  fro  as  this 
multitude?  ...  I  see  them  lay  their  heads  together  to  sur- 
prise me.  .  .  .  My  sword  make  way  for  me,  for  here  is  no 
staying. 

The  tide  of  sedition  has  ebbed,  the  mob  has  soon  vanished,  and 
Jack  Cade's  head  is  presently  brought  in  triumph  to  the  King. 

The  fifth  act  makes  a  point  of  transition  to  that  which  is  to  be 
the  final  phase  of  all  this  dramatised  history,  and  the  new  region 
in  which  the  oscillations  of  fortune  are  to  be  traced.  It  merely 
brings  to  a  climax  what  has  run  as  a  side  issue  through  the  two 
dramas,  —  the  rising  claims  of  the  House  of  York.  At  first  ^  it 
was  but  a  heated  dispute  of  noble  friends  in  the  Temple-garden ; 

1 1  Henry  the  Sixth  ;  IL  iv. 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  29 1 

plain  Richard  Plantagenet  has  insisted,  against  Somerset,  upon  a 
point  of  family  honour. 

Plantagenet.   Since  you  are  tongue-tied  and  so  loath  to  speak, 
In  dumb  significants  proclaim  your  thoughts  : 
Let  him  that  is  a  true-born  gentleman, 
And  stands  upon  the  honour  of  his  birth, 
If  he  suppose  that  I  have  pleaded  truth, 
P'rom  off  this  brier  pluck  a  white  rose  with  me. 

Somerset.        Let  him  that  is  no  coward  nor  no  flatterer, 
But  dare  maintain  the  party  of  the  truth. 
Pluck  a  red  rose  from  off  this  thorn  with  me. 

At  the  end  of  this  famous  scene  Warwick  makes  prophecy : 

Warwick.  This  brawl  to-day. 

Grown  to  this  faction  in  the  Temple-garden, 
Shall  send  between  the  red  rose  and  the  white 
A  thousand  souls  to  death  and  deadly  night. 

So  far  the  question  is  only  whether  Richard  Plantagenet  is 
tainted  by  his  father's  treason;  in  the  next  scene,^  conference 
with  the  dying  Mortimer  stretches  the  claim,  not  to  a  dukedom 
of  York,  but  to  the  throne  of  England.  As  a  next  step,^  both  the 
main  factions  agree  in  a  bill  for  restoring  Richard  Plantagenet, 
and  the  King  creates  him  Duke  of  York.  In  the  second  play,  his 
secret  ambitions  become  public  property  :  an  armourer  is  accused 
by  his  apprentice  of  saying  that  York  is  rightful  heir  to  the 
throne ;  York  may  indignantly  denounce  the  traitor,  but  hence- 
forth he  is  a  marked  man.*  He  is  forced  forward  in  his  ambition, 
gathers  friends  round  him,  and  to  these  unfolds  his  claim,  win- 
ning powerful  support.'*  His  foes,  upon  an  outbreak  of  rebellion 
in  Ireland,  combine  to  send  York  into  safe  obscurity  on  pretext  of 
service  against  the  rebels.*    York  sees  his  chance. — 

1  /  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  v.  8  //  Henry  the  Sixth  :  I.  iii.  30,  180-225. 

2  /  Henry  the  Sixth  .•  1 1 1,  i,  from  149.         ^  II  Henry  the  Sixth  :  II.  ii. 

6//  Henry  the  Sixth  ;  III.  i,  from  282. 


292  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

'Twas  men  I  lack'd,  and  you  will  give  them  me : 

I  take  it  kindly ;  yet  be  well  assured 

You  put  sharp  weapons  in  a  madman's  hands. 

York  returns  from  Ireland  with  an  army  at  his  back ;  he  gradually 
throws  off  the  disguise,  and  puts  forward  pretensions  to  the  crown.^ 
There  is  a  fresh  precipitation  of  factious  England  into  new  com- 
binations ;  the  battle  of  St.  Alban's  is  a  trial  of  strength,  and  York 
at  least  holds  his  own.  Thus  we  pass  to  the  new  phase  of  our 
history ;  it  is  no  more  a  case  of  sedition,  but  of  armies  and  the 
battlefield  ;  the  pendulum  of  fortune  is  to  sway  between  York  and 
Lancaster  in  the  campaigns  that  make  up  the  Wars  of  the  Roses. 
At  the  outset  ^  the  White  Rose  is  seen  in  the  ascendant :  the 
Yorkists  have  seized  the  palace,  and  King  Henry,  to  save  his  very 
ParHament  house  from  being  a  shambles,  weakly  makes  compro- 
mise, granting  the  succession  to  his  rival  if  his  own  reign  may  be 
undisturbed.  Revulsion  of  feeling  against  a  father  who  thus  dis- 
inherits his  son  throws  moral  force  to  the  side  of  the  Lancastrian 
queen ;  the  Red  Rose  is  victorious  at  Wakefield ;  the  Duke  of 
York  is  taken  prisoner,  is  mocked  with  a  paper  crown,  while  the 
inhuman  Margaret  flourishes  in  his  face  a  napkin  dyed  with  the 
blood  of  the  tender  son  of  York,  whom  CHfford  has  just  assassi- 
nated. Fate,  as  if  in  horror  of  such  bloodthirsty  passion,  swings 
to  the  other  side  :  Towton  field  knows  many  mutations,  but  in  the 
end  the  Lancastrians  are  routed,  butcher  Clifford  has  fallen  and 
his  corpse  is  mocked  by  the  foe ;  finally  King  Henry  is  passively 
taken  prisoner  by  two  foresters,  who,  for  all  their  simplicity,  weigh 
more  in  the  scales  of  war  than  the  peaceful  King.  When  the 
Duke  of  York  is  seated  triumphantly  on  the  throne  with  the  Lan- 
castrian rivals  in  exile,  prosperity  makes  him  wanton :  he  insists 
upon  a  mesalliance  which  insults  his  party,  his  own  brother 
Clarence,  and  Warwick  the  main  bulwark  of  his  power,  passing 
over  to  the  enemy ;  the  downward  sway  of  Yorkist  fortune  con- 

1 II  Henry  the  Sixth,  from  V.  i. 

2  For  references  see  scheme  in  Appendix,  below,  pages  368-369. 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  293 

tinues  into  the  war  which  breaks  out  anew,  and  its  first  incident  is 
an  inglorious  surprise  of  Edward's  camp,  the  King  being  captured 
in  his  gown.  The  oscillations  of  fate  now  become  more  rapid. 
Almost  immediately  the  star  of  York  is  in  the  ascendant ;  what 
surprise  lately  did  stratagem  now  undoes;  and  King  Edward 
escapes,  carrying  his  warder  with  him.  Again :  the  action  dis- 
plays a  happy  hour  for  the  Lancastrians ;  their  King  is  seen  released 
from  captivity,  making  Clarence  and  Warwick  the  agents  of  his 
rule.  In  another  moment  we  have  King  Henry  recaptured  in  his 
palace ;  the  flowing  tide  is  with  the  Yorkists,  and  in  rapid  succes- 
sion we  have  the  double  desertion  of  Clarence,  the  death  of  War- 
wick, the  fatal  battles  of  Barnet  and  Tewkesbury,  the  assassination 
of  the  Prince  of  Wales  and  of  the  King. 

When  we  pass  to  the  play  entitled  Richard  the  Third,  the  Wars 
of  the  Roses  seem  to  be  over ;  the  truth  is  rather  that  they  have 
reached  their  climax  —  the  natural  chmax  of  the  victors  falling  out 
over  the  spoils.  The  pendulum  movement  traced  through  so 
many  plays  also  attains  its  climax :  the  dramatic  counterpoint 
doubles,  and  two  distinct  alternations  are  perceptible  side  by  side. 
For  one,  the  whole  play  in  its  main  plot  is  but  a  single  swing  of 
the  pendulum  ;  it  is  the  Rise  and  Fall  of  Richard  ;  villany  irresist- 
ible strangely  elevates  Gloucester  to  a  giddy  height,  and  no  less 
mysteriously  irresistible  nemesis  drags  him  down.  While  the  rise 
of  Richard  is  in  progress,  the  underplot  (as  we  have  seen  in  a 
former  chapter)^  is  made  by  the  alternate  rise  and  fall  of  indi- 
viduals composing  the  faction  of  York  —  Clarence,  the  Queen's 
kindred,  Hastings,  Buckingham  :  whoever  triumphs  over  the  last 
becomes  the  victim  of  the  next.  And  the  protracted  fall  of  Rich- 
ard (we  have  seen)  takes  the  form  of  tantalising  fluctuations  of 
hope  and  despair,  as  messages  pour  in  from  a  distance,  or  delusive 
victory  mocks  him  in  the  battle  itself.  That  no  mode  of  emphasis 
may  be  wanting,  the  passion  of  the  play  catches  the  rhythm  of 
alternation  :  Margaret's  curses  and  Richard's  retort  unify  at  the  last 
moment  the  whole  war  of  factions,  York  made  the  nemesis  upon 

1  Above,  pages  41-42. 


294  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

Lancaster,  and  Lancaster  upon  York,  from  generation  to  genera- 
tion. Only  with  the  death  of  Richard  does  the  long  drawn 
movement  reach  a  position  of  rest : 

Now  civil  wars  are  stopped ;  peace  lives  again. 

The  continuous  succession  of  plays  is  exhausted ;  but  there  still 
remains  the  drama  of  Henry  the  Eighth^  which  criticism  loves  to 
call  the  epilogue  to  Shakespeare's  dramatic  history  of  England. 
The  suggestion  is  interesting,  for  the  first  note  struck  by  the 
prologue  to  this  play  is  mutation  of  fortune  ;  we  are  bidden  to  look 
upon  grand  personages  of  history  in  their  pomp  and  pride,  and 
then  see  — 

How  soon  this  mightiness  meets  misery. 

Moreover,  as  we  have  seen  in  our  discussion  of  the  drama,  what 
there  is  in  it  of  history  takes  the  form  of  rise  and  fall ;  successive 
stages  in  the  rise  of  the  young  beauty,  and  successive  stages  in 
the  fall  of  the  older  wife  who  must  make  way  for  her.  But  we 
also  saw  that  there  was  another  element  of  interest  in  Henry 
the  Eighth,  different  from  this.  The  larger  Hfe  of  history  in  this 
drama  mingles  with  the  more  confined  Hfe  of  personality.  Four 
personages  were  made  prominent  —  Buckingham,  Katherine, 
Wolsey,  Cranmer :  these  were  not  treated  —  hke  John,  Queen 
Margaret,  Warwick,  Clifford,  and  the  like  —  from  the  outside  only, 
as  so  many  pieces  on  the  chess-board  of  history.  The  inner  life 
of  individuality  was,  for  these  four  personages,  fully  displayed  ;  we 
were  able  to  see  how  that  which  is  a  fall  in  the  life  without  may  be 
a  rise  in  the  life  within,  how  external  elevation  may  be  spiritual 
poverty.  The  outer  Hfe  of  each  individual  is  part  of  the  pageant 
of  history ;  whether  he  be  small  or  great,  his  external  career  may 
be  swung  into  currents  for  which  he  is  not  responsible,  yet  which 
he  cannot  resist.  But  whoever  has  awakened  to  a  consciousness 
of  a  life  within  has  a  realm  of  his  own  outside  the  sway  of  history  ; 
for  the  determination  of  individual  character  the  individual  him- 
self is  solely  responsible. 


THE  PENDULUM  OF  HISTORY  295 

The  pendulum  swing  of  events,  the  ceaseless  oscillation  of 
fortune,  the  alternate  rise  and  fall  of  the  scales  in  which  issues  are 
weighed,  this  —  with  shadowings  of  rest  for  relief  or  contrast  —  is 
the  law  of  history,  as  history  is  dramatised  in  Shakespeare.  Like 
the  colour  of  the  atmosphere  —  invisible  in  the  air  around  us, 
showing  deep  blue  as  we  gaze  into  the  depths  of  space  —  this 
pendulum  of  events  is  only  traceable  on  the  vast  scale  of  national 
history,  in  which  the  minutes  and  hours  are  reigns  and  dynasties. 
It  is  an  intelligible  principle ;  so  much  of  natural  history  takes  the 
form  of  action  and  reaction,  that  it  need  not  seem  strange  if  tem- 
poral history,  seen  in  extenso,  should  have  ebbs  and  flows  of  its 
tide.  The  conception  of  alternate  rise  and  fall  of  human  institu- 
tions seems  in  close  harmony  with  the  scheme  of  providential  gov- 
ernment that  was  '  wisdom  '  to  the  Hebrew  psalmist : 

He  turneth  rivers  into  a  wilderness, 

And  water  springs  into  a  thirsty  ground ; 

A  fruitful  land  into  a  salt  desert, 

For  the  wickedness  of  them  that  dwell  therein. 

He  turneth  a  wilderness  into  a  pool  of  water, 

And  a  dry  land  into  water  springs. 

And  there  he  maketh  the  hungry  to  dwell, 

That  they  may  prepare  a  city  of  habitation ; 

And  sow  fields,  and  plant  vineyards, 

And  get  them  fruits  of  increase. 

He  blesseth  them  also,  so  that  they  are  multiplied  greatly; 

And  he  sufTereth  not  their  cattle  to  decrease. 

Again,  they  are  minished  and  bowed  down 

Through  oppression,  trouble,  and  sorrow. 

He  poureth  contempt  upon  princes, 

And  causeth  them  to  wander  in  the  waste,  where  there  is  no  way. 

Yet  setteth  he  the  needy  on  high  from  affliction, 
And  maketh  him  families  like  a  flock. 
The  upright  shall  see  it,  and  be  glad ; 
And  all  iniquity  shall  stop  her  mouth. 


296  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

As  it  appears  in  Shakespeare,  this  sway  of  history  is  wholly  free 
from  suggestion  of  fataHsm.  Throughout  the  ten  plays  there  has 
been  no  hint  of  malicious  destiny  mocking  strenuous  endeavour, 
such  as  Greek  tragedy  delighted  to  display;  there  has  been  no 
unnatural  interference  witli  the  consequences  of  acts.  And  the 
epilogue  play  comes  to  make  impressive  the  distinction  of  story 
and  history :  it  is  but  the  outer  life,  entangled  with  the  lives  of 
others,  on  which  the  swing  of  historic  movement  can  exercise  even 
the  slightest  impulse ;  the  life  of  inner  personality  is  entirely  our 
own. 


XIV 

SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY  IN  THE  MORAL  WORLD  OF 
SHAKESPEARE 

In  our  survey  of  the  forces  of  life  we  commenced  with  what  is 
nearest  to  us,  individual  will.  We  then  saw  how  Shakespearean 
drama  indicates  the  Hmitations  on  personal  will ;  from  within,  in 
heredity  and  character ;  from  without,  in  the  sway  of  immediately 
surrounding  circumstance.  In  the  preceding  chapter  we  went  still 
further  afield,  and  noted  how  the  vast  movements  of  history,  only 
perceptible  when  time  is  surveyed  on  a  large  scale,  constitute  a 
force,  to  which  individual  will  may  yield  or  rise  superior.  In  this 
chapter  we  have  to  go  beyond  the  bounds  of  that  ordinary  course 
of  things  we  call  Nature,  and  inquire  as  to  the  Supernatural,  how 
far  it  is  one  of  the  forces  of  life  in  Shakespearean  drama.  I  do 
not  here  speak  of  God,  nor  of  the  system  of  law  or  providence  in 
which  his  action  may  be  manifested.  The  question  is  of  super- 
natural agencies  :  how  the  system  of  Shakespeare  is  related  to  the 
varied  powers,  familiar  in  human  tradition,  which  come  between 
the  ordinary  course  of  Nature,  and  the  supreme  force  of  Deity. 

It  is  obvious  that  from  the  present  point  of  view  two  plays  of 
Shakespeare  stand  apart  from  all  the  rest,  and  form  a  class  by 
themselves.  In  A  Midsummer- Nigh  fs  Dream  and  in  The  Tem- 
pest^ the  whole  action  is  permeated  by  the  supernatural.  But  it  is 
clear  that  these  two  dramas  are  in  no  way  pictures  of  real  life  ; 
they  are  dramatisations  of  the  supernatural.  Fairy  existence  in 
the  one,  magic  and  enchantment  in  the  other,  are  the  hypotheses 
on  which  the  whole  story  rests.  It  does  not  follow  that  much  may 
not  be  learned  from  these  plays  with  reference  to  the  moral  system 
of  Shakespeare ;  but  they  have  no  bearing  upon  the  question  im- 

297 


298  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

mediately  before  us  —  the  position  of  supernatural  agency  in  real 
life. 

In  the  other  plays  free  use  seems  to  be  made  of  what  in  ordi- 
nary parlance  is  called  the  supernatural.  In  Cy?nbeitne  gods  and 
goddesses  of  classical  antiquity  descend  upon  the  scene.  The 
oracle,  which  was  so  important  in  classical  drama,  makes  a  pivotal 
point  for  Winter's  Tale,  and  has  a  subordinate  place  in  Cymbeline  ; 
although  in  both  these  poems  the  local  colour  is  modern  rather 
than  ancient.  Soothsayers,  and  innumerable  forms  of  omen,  such 
as  in  antiquity  went  hand  in  hand  with  oracles,  are  used  to  a  con- 
siderable extent  in  Shakespeare's  Roman  plays;  and  similar  de- 
vices^ appear  in  some  of  the  plays  of  English  history.  Fiends 
make  an  appearance  in  the  first  part  of  Henry  the  Sixth  in  con- 
nection with  the  sorcery  of  La  Pucelle ;  in  Henry  the  Eighth  we 
have  a  vision  of  angels.  Witches,  and  the  apparitions  their  spells 
can  raise,  play  a  prominent  part  in  the  tragedy  of  Macbeth,  And 
ghosts  seem  to  have  an  important  share  in  the  action  of  the  dramas 
of  Hamlet,  Julius  Ccesar,  Macbeth,  Richard  the  Third. 

An  attempt  is  often  made  to  get  rid  of  this  apparently  super- 
natural element  in  Shakespeare's  plays  by  rationalising  it  out  of 
all  real  existence;  the  ghosts  and  omens  (it  is  said)  are  but 
hallucinations  of  those  who  see  or  hear  them ;  Macbeth's  witches 
are  but  a  stage  symbol  for  the  spirit  of  temptation.  Such  sugges- 
tions usually  come  from  criticism  that  has  never  frankly  accepted 
inductive  examination  of  the  literature  as  the  sole  ground  of  the 
discussion ;  and  the  rationalising  proposal  is  dictated  by  a  desire 
to  bring  Shakespeare  into  harmony  with  our  own  more  advanced 
age,  that  has  got  rid  entirely  of  oracles  and  soothsayers,  and  only 
smiles  at  a  ghost  story.  But  such  a  line  of  argument  is,  even  from 
its  own  point  of  view,  hazardous  ;  for  if  a  single  case  of  the  super- 
natural in  Shakespeare  is  accepted,  all  chance  of  his  being  pre- 
sented as  a  modern  rationalist  is  gone.  Yet,  unless  violence  is  to 
be  done  to  every  indication  of  the  text,  who  can  explain  away  the 
Ghost  in  Hamlet  or  the  Witches  in  Macbeth  f  The  Ghost  is  seen 
1  E^.  Peter  of  Pomfret  in  the  play  of  Kin^  John. 


SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY  IN   SHAKESPEARE  299 

by  different  persons  at  the  same  time,  by  the  same  persons  at 
different  times ;  he  makes  known  circumstances  not  known  before, 
and  subsequently  confirmed  by  evidence.  If  this  is  not  sufficient, 
by  what  kind  of  evidence  will  it  ever  be  possible  to  substantiate 
objective  existence?  Similarly,  the  Witches  not  only  appear  to 
Banquo  as  well  as  to  Macbeth,  but  they  are  shown  alone,  plying  the 
ordinary  trade  of  witches  ;  if  their  predictions  in  the  first  act  might 
be  guesses,  what  is  to  be  said  of  the  fourth  act,  in  which  their 
apparitions  foresee  the  history  of  Scotland  for  centuries  and  the 
union  of  the  three  crowns?^  This  is  presented  as  supernatural 
knowledge,  and  only  with  supernatural  knowledge  can  the  scene 
be  reconciled.  I  am  not  questioning  that  some  of  Shakespeare's 
supernatural  phenomena  can  be  explained  as  hallucinations ;  my 
argument  is  that  in  every  case  it  must  be  a  question  of  the  evi- 
dence from  the  details  of  the  play. 

It  is  indeed  not  easy  to  find  any  criterion  upon  which  we  can 
absolutely  rely  for  testing  reality  in  the  supernatural  agencies 
of  Shakespearean  drama.  It  might  have  been  expected  that  such 
a  criterion  would  be  found  in  the  stage-directions,  in  which  a 
dramatist  speaks  for  himself.  In  Shakespeare  there  are  doubts  as 
to  the  authenticity  of  the  stage-directions.  But  even  if  this  point 
be  waived,  we  find  that  what  directions  there  are  seem  equivocal 
in  their  bearing  on  the  present  issue.  The  case  has  already  been 
noted ^  of  the  Banquet  Scene  in  Macbeth,  where  stage-directions 
declare  that  the  Ghost  sits  in  a  particular  chair,  that  it  disappears 
and  reappears,  whereas  it  is  certain  in  this  instance  that  the  appari- 
tion is  wholly  the  creation  of  Macbeth's  imagination ;  here  then 
stage- directions  are  no  more  than  a  symbol,  assisting  us  as  to 
what  Macbeth  is  supposed  to  see.  A  somewhat  similar,  but  much 
more  intricate  case,  is  the  second  Ghost  Scene  in  Hamlet:  ^  here 
the  opposing  evidence  is  difficult  to  balance.  On  the  one  hand, 
the  stage-directions  state  that  the  Ghost  enters,  that  it  makes  exit ; 
more  than  this,  a  speech  of  six  lines  is  represented  as  spoken  by 

1  Macbeth :  IV.  i.  120-121.  2  Above,  page  260. 

^Hamlet:  III.  iv. 


300  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF   SHAKESPEARE 

the  Ghost.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  made  positive  that  the  ap- 
parition is  seen  and  heard  by  none  but  Hamlet  himself. 

Queen.       To  whom  do  you  speak  this? 

Hamlet.  Do  you  see  nothing  there? 

Queen.       Nothing  at  all ;  yet  all  that  is  I  see. 

Hamlet.     Nor  did  you  nothing  hear? 

Queen.  No,  nothing  but  ourselves. 

Hamlet.     Why,  look  you  there !  look,  how  it  steals  away ! 
My  father,  in  his  habit  as  he  lived  ! 
Look,  where  he  goes,  even  now,  out  at  the  portal ! 

{Exit  Ghost. 

Queen.      This  is  the  very  coinage  of  your  brain  : 
This  bodiless  creation  ecstasy 
Is  very  cunning  in. 

Hamlet.  Ecstasy ! 

My  pulse,  as  yours,  doth  temperately  keep  time, 
And  makes  as  healthful  music :    it  is  not  madness 
That  I  have  utter'd :  bring  me  to  the  test, 
And  I  the  matter  will  re-word  ;  which  madness 
Would  gambol  from. 

It  is  intelligible  enough  that  a  man  who'has  once  been  so  shocked, 
as  Hamlet  had  been,  by  a  visit  from  the  unseen  world  should  in 
a  future  moment  of  excitement,  create  the  supernatural  visitor  by 
mental  act.  And  this  view  receives  support  from  the  particular 
form  taken  by  this  second  apparition ;  Hamlet  has  just  been  pour- 
ing out  his  soul  in  a  vivid  picture  to  his  mother  of  the  husband 
she  had  shghted,  and  the  Ghost  appears,  not  the  armed  warrior 
of  the  first  act,  but  the  subject  of  Hamlet's  description  : 

My  father,  in  his  habit  as  he  lived. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  does  seem  violence  of  interpretation  to 
understand  the  Ghost's  speech  of  six  lines  as  nothing  more  than  a 
symbolic  way  of  indicating  what  Hamlet  thinks.  And  yet  certain 
considerations  favour  this  view.  As  in  the  case  of  Macbeth,^  it  is 
what  is  uppermost  in  Hamlet's  mind  at  the  moment  that  would 
1  Compare  above,  pages  255,  260-262. 


SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY  IN  SHAKESPEARE  30I 

thus  find  expression  in  the  form  of  hallucination.  The  spirit  in 
which  Hamlet  goes  to  the  interview  with  his  mother  is  thus  con- 
veyed.^ 

Hamlet.    'Tis  now  the  very  witching  time  of  night, 

When  churchyards  yawn,  and  hell  itself  breathes  out 
Contagion  to  this  world :  now  could  I  drink  hot  blood, 
And  do  such  bitter  business  as  the  day 
Would  quake  to  look  on.     Soft !  now  to  my  mother. 

0  heart,  lose  not  thy  nature ;  let  not  ever 
The  soul  of  Nero  enter  this  firm  bosom : 
Let  me  be  cruel,  not  unnatural : 

1  will  speak  daggers  to  her,  but  use  none. 

He  is  in  a  state  of  violent  excitement ;  his  mind  is  running  upon 
apparitions  from  the  grave  and  from  hell ;  two  thoughts  are  strug- 
gling within  him  —  the  two  thoughts  planted  in  his  soul  by  the 
Ghost  Scene  of  the  first  act  —  revenge,  and  some  final  tenderness 
to  the  mother.  Now,  the  speech  attributed  to  the  apparition  is 
just  made  up  of  these  two  thoughts. 

Hamlet.     Do  you  not  come  your  tardy  son  to  chide, 
That,  lapsed  in  time  and  passion,  lets  go  by 
The  important  acting  of  your  dread  command? 
O,  say  ! 

Ghost.        Do  not  forget :  this  visitation 

Is  but  to  whet  thy  almost  blunted  purpose. 
But,  look,  amazement  on  thy  mother  sits  : 
O,  step  between  her  and  her  fighting  soul ; 
Conceit  in  weakest  bodies  strongest  works  : 
Speak  to  her,  Hamlet. 

The  first  word  of  the  apparition,  put  into  his  mouth  by  Hamlet's 
question,  is  the  revenge ;  the  second,  is  the  relenting  to  the 
woman's  weakness.  And  this  speech  makes  the  turning-point  of 
the  scene  :  of  the  two  ideas  contending  all  along  for  mastery 
in  Hamlet's  mind  he  has  hitherto  carried  out  the  one ;  from  this 
point  he  devotes  himself  to  the  other.  Real  or  not  real,  the 
^HamUt:  IIL  ii.  406. 


302  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF   SHAKESPEARE 

Ghost  gives  expression  to  the  mind  of  Hamlet.  Between  indica- 
tions so  evenly  balanced  I  will  not  undertake  to  pronounce.  But 
a  third  alternative  is  worthy  of  consideration.  Seeing  that  ghosts 
belong,  not  to  the  domain  of  natural  law,  but  to  the  unknown 
supernatural,  may  it  be  that  objective  and  subjective  have  no 
application  to  them?  or  that  they  can  appear  objective  and  sub- 
jective at  the  same  time?  Just  as,  even  within  the  limits  of  the 
positive  world,  there  are  objective  vibrations  of  air  so  rapid  that 
only  some  ears,  and  not  all,  can  catch  them,  so  may  it  be  a  quality 
of  the  supernatural  apparition  that  it  has  objective  existence,  yet 
is  perceptible,  not  to  all  eyes  and  ears,  but  only  to  those  of  one 
tuned  (so  to  speak)  into  harmony  with  the  mind  of  the  apparition, 
by  crime,  or  kinship,  or  mission  of  revenge  ? 

The  general  drift  of  these  remarks  is,  that  the  important  question 
in  reference  to  supernatural  agencies  in  Shakespeare  is,  not  their 
objective  reahty,  but  their  function  in  the  plot.  Does  the  course  of 
the  drama  indicate  that  what  appears  as  a  manifestation  of  some- 
thing outside  ordinary  Nature  can  exercise  influence  upon  men  and 
events  ?  On  the  answer  to  this  depends  the  question  whether  super- 
natural agency  is  one  of  the  forces  of  life  in  Shakespeare's  world. 

On  this  point  it  appears  to  me  that  three  propositions  may  be 
laid  down.  First :  Supernatural  agency  in  Shakespeare  has  no 
power  to  influence  events  unless  by  influencing  persons.  A  large 
proportion  of  the  supernatural  in  these  dramas  is  concerned  with 
the  indication  of  future  events.  The  event  always  agrees  with  the 
prediction  :  the  knowledge  of  the  future  is  supernatural.  We  are 
thus  brought  to  the  grand  question  which  has  perplexed  theology 
for  centuries  :  Does  foreknowledge  imply  predestination?  What- 
ever may  be  the  truth  in  theology,  the  practice  of  Shakespeare  is 
unmistakable.  The  key-note  is  given  by  the  striking  words  which 
Banquo  addresses  to  the  Witches  : 

If  you  can  look  into  the  seeds  of  time, 

And  say  which  grain  will  grow  and  which  will  not, 

Speak  then  to  me.* 

I  Macbeth :  I.  iii.  $8. 


SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY   IN   SHAKESPEARE  303 

A  power  is  implied  which  is  superhuman,  the  power  to  read  the 
future.  But  the  future  so  read  is  a  future  brought  about  by 
natural  causes,  by  seed  and  its  fructification,  and  by  no  other 
power.  On  this  text  Shakespeare's  whole  treatment  of  the  super- 
natural is  a  comment :  there  is  infaUible  prediction,  there  is  also  a 
rational  train  of  causes  and  effects  bringing  about  the  issue  pre- 
dicted. Such  foreshadovvings  as  omens,  oracles,  visions,  affect  the 
question  only  negatively ;  in  these  cases  we  have  pure  revelation 
of  the  future,  with  no  suggestion  of  an  agency  behind  prediction 
or  fulfilment.  The  Ghosts  who  make  the  vision  of  Richard  the 
Third  point  to  the  morrow ;  but  there  is  nothing  to  imply  that 
they  can  affect  the  issue  of  the  battle  —  except  by  depressing  the 
spirits  of  Richard  and  raising  those  of  Richmond,  But  the  lead- 
ing illustration  of  this  principle  is  of  course  the  play  of  Macbeth. 
Here  the  Witches  make  elaborate  predictions  of  the  future,  all  of 
them  exactly  fulfilled.  In  each  case  however  Shakespeare  has 
enabled  us  to  see  a  regular  succession  of  natural  causes,  amply 
sufficient  to  bring  about  the  result.  Macbeth  is  to  be  thane  of 
Glamis  and  thane  of  Cawdor ;  he  becomes  the  first  by  his  father's 
death,  the  second  by  promotion  to  the  position  of  the  rebel  he 
had  overcome ;  there  is  no  room  here  for  intervention  of  the 
Witches.  Macbeth  is  told  he  shall  be  king  :  we  have  had  occasion 
to  trace  the  fluctuation  of  events  by  which  he  becomes  king,  but 
there  is  no  hint  of  the  influence  of  the  Witches,  except  so  far  as 
their  words  may  have  influenced  Macbeth  himself  in  the  part  he 
plays.  The  Witches  make  the  double-edged  forecast  as  to 
Banquo,  that  he  shall  be  lesser  than  Macbeth  and  yet  greater,  that 
he  shall  get  kings  though  he  be  none ;  all  is  fulfilled  in  the 
moment  when  the  father  is  struck  by  murderers,  and  in  the  dark 
the  nimble  son  escapes;  yet  in  this  attack  the  Witches  do  not 
appear,  unless  it  was  their  words  that  set  Macbeth  on  to  this 
crime.  Yet  again,  there  is  the  dark  saying  about  Birnam  Wood 
coming  to  Dunsinane ;  but  we  know  by  how  natural  a  train  of  in- 
cidents the  marvel  was  made  a  reality;  no  supernatural  instiga- 
tion, but  only  a  happy  thought  of  military  stratagem  brought  it 


304  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

about.^  There  was  another  dark  saying,  that  only  the  man  "  not 
born  of  woman  "  could  slay  Macbeth ;  we  are  allowed  to  see  how 
the  individual  to  whom  alone  that  description  appHes  receives  an 
injury  of  his  own  from  the  tyrant,  in  addition  to  the  injuries  he 
resents  on  behalf  of  his  country;^  the  double  motive  brings  Mac- 
duff naturally  to  the  vengeance,  in  which,  it  is  easy  to  understand, 
his  passionate  power  is  irresistible.  The  supernatural  agencies 
revealed  by  Shakespeare  stand  aloof  from  the  game  of  life  as 
spectators ;  as  spectators  they  can  see  further  than  the  players ; 
but  they  have  no  means  of  affecting  the  play  itself,  except  so  far 
as  what  they  report  may  influence  the  minds  of  the  players. 

How  far  then  can  supernatural  agencies  influence  persons  in  the 
drama  ?  Here  a  second  proposition  may  be  laid  down  :  The 
supernatural  has  no  power  over  men  except  by  their  own  consent. 
It  may  be  asked,  How  does  Richard  consent  to  the  ghostly  visit- 
ants who  torment  him,  or  where  is  there  consent  to  the  omens 
which  disturb  the  world  of  the  Roman  plays?  The  answer  is, 
that  consent  is  given  by  deeds  as  well  as  by  words.  Crime  is  a 
debt :  Richard  has  given  his  victims'  ghosts  the  hold  on  him  that 
the  creditor  has  on  the  lingering  debtor.  The  application  of  the 
principle  to  the  omens  in  Julius  Ccesar  is  very  clear.  To  the 
world  at  large  these  are  meaningless;  they  come  down  with  a 
weight  of  influence  only  on  those  who  in  their  hearts  have  ac- 
cepted that  to  which  the  omens  are  pointing.  Casca^  pours  out 
a  description  of  the  heavens  in  supernatural  convulsion ;  Cicero 
makes  answer : 

Why,  saw  you  anything  more  wonderful  ? 

Still  more  excitedly  Casca  tells  of  portents  on  earth  passing  belief; 
still  his  interlocutor  remarks  coolly  : 

Indeed,  it  is  a  strange-disposed  time : 

But  men  may  construe  things  after  their  fashion, 

Clean  from  the  purpose  of  the  things  themselves. 

1  Macbeth  :  V.  iv.  2  Macbeth  :  IV.  iii,  from  159.  «  Julius  CcBsar :  I.  iii. 


SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY  IN  SHAKESPEARE  305 

In  a  moment  Cassius  comes :  how  does  he  treat  the  wild  phe- 
nomena on  which  Casca  is  so  eloquent? 

Cassitcs.     For  my  part,  I  have  walkM  about  the  streets, 

Submitting  me  unto  the  perilous  night. 

And,  thus  unbraced,  Casca,  as  you  see. 

Have  bared  my  bosom  to  the  thunder-stone  .  .  <. 

Now  could  I,  Casca,  name  to  thee  a  man 

Most  like  this  dreadful  night. 

That  thunders,  lightens,  open  graves,  and  roars 

As  doth  the  lion  in  the  Capitol, 

A  man  no  mightier  than  thyself  or  me 

In  personal  action,  yet  prodigious  grown 

And  fearful,  as  these  strange  eruptions  are. 
Casca.        'Tis  Caesar  that  you  mean. 

Cicero  and  the  innocent  see  curiosities,  where  men  with  con- 
spiracy in  their  hearts  see  encouraging  omens  from  heaven.  The 
play  of  Macbeth  is  again  in  point.  The  Witches  first  meet  the 
hero  in  company  with  Banquo  :  Banquo  questions  in  vain,  but  as 
soon  as  Macbeth  speaks  a  single  word,  the  predictions  flow  out.^ 
As  we  have  seen,  Macbeth's  start  explains  the  difference  :  he  had 
already  sworn  treason  against  King  Duncan  in  his  heart.  The 
second  time  the  Witches  exercise  their  function,  it  is  Macbeth 
who  has  sought  them  out,  and  by  the  power  of  curses  forced  them, 
in  spite  of  their  resistance,  to  speak  of  the  future.^  The  prin- 
ciple applies  similarly  to  Hamlet?  When  Bernardo  and  Marcellus 
first  see  the  Ghost,  they  fear  to  question,  and  the  apparition  makes 
no  communication.  When  Horatio  goes  further  and  addresses 
the  strange  figure  thus  — 

What  art  thou,  that  usurp'st  this  time  of  night. 
Together  with  that  fair  and  warlike  form 
In  which  the  majesty  of  buried  Denmark 
Did  sometimes  march  ?  — 

his  unfortunate  word  "  usurp'st "  implies  a  doubt,  and  the  appari- 
tion stalks  offended  away.     On  its  return,  Horatio  makes  solemn 

1  Macbeth:  I.  iii.  39-50.      2  Macbeth:  III.  iv.  132;  IV.  i.  50.      «  Hamlet:  I.  i,  iv. 
X 


306  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

adjuration ;  the  apparition  seems  about  to  speak,  when  the  sound 
of  cock-crow  marks  the  end  of  night's  Umitation.  Subsequently 
Hamlet  himself  recognises  his  father,  and  implores  communica- 
tion of  his  thought :  only  then  is  the  revelation  fully  vouchsafed. 
In  each  case  consent  to  receive  the  revelation  is  implied.  All 
this  may  seem  to  amount  to  no  more  than  the  popular  super- 
stition, that  a  ghost  cannot  speak  until  spoken  to.  But  it  is 
striking  that  the  great  traditional  machinery  of  the  supernatural 
—  a  celestial  and  an  infernal  hierarchy  impelling  men  to  good 
and  to  evil  —  is  absent  entirely  from  Shakespeare's  world;  the 
only  angels  who  appear  signify  to  Katherine  that  the  victory  of 
life  is  won ;  the  only  fiends  are  invoked  by  La  Pucelle,  and  sig- 
nify their  powerlessness  to  help.^  Shakespeare's  supernatural 
agencies  are  what  Banquo  calls  them  —  instruments  of  darkness : 
of  no  significance  except  in  hands  that  consent  to  use  them. 

We  may  go  yet  further  in  the  third  of  our  propositions  :  The 
influence  in  Shakespeare  of  the  supernatural  on  persons  is  seen  to 
emphasise  and  assist,  but  never  to  initiate  or  alter,  a  course  of 
action.  Supernatural  power  can  only — to  borrow  a  Shakespearean 
phrase  —  marshal  men  the  way  that  they  are  going.  In  Winter's 
Tale  Leontes  has  passionately  invoked  the  oracle  as  his  final  court 
of  appeal :  as  soon  as  it  has  spoken  against  him  he  exclaims  : 

There  is  no  truth  at  all  i'  the  oracle : 

The  sessions  shall  proceed :  this  is  mere  falsehood. 

It  takes  natural  events  —  the  report  of  son  and  wife's  death  —  to 
turn  him  from  his  headlong  career.  Richard  after  the  Ghost  Scene 
declares  that  shadows  have  struck  more  terror  to  his  soul  than  all  the 
forces  of  the  enemy  :  but  he  only  fights  the  harder  in  the  morrow's 
battle.  As  before,  it  is  the  plays  of  Macbeth  and  Hamlet  that 
are  the  crucial  tests  of  Shakespeare's  mode  of  handling  the  super- 
natural. In  the  former  we  have  a  series  of  shocks,  each  promising 
to  change  Macbeth's  action,  each  ending  by  leaving  it  where  it 
would  otherwise  have  been.  The  word  "Thou  shalt  be  King" 
1  Henry  the  Eighth :  IV.  ii ;  /  Henry  the  Sixth ;  V.  iii. 


SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY  IN  SHAKESPEARE  307 

(as  we  have  seen^)  inflames  for  the  moment  Macbeth's  former 

purpose  of  treason ;  at  the  end  of  the  scene  he  drops  the  treason ; 

in  the  next  scene — for  rational  considerations — he  falls  back  to  his 

first  plans.     When  the  Witches  have  promised  Banquo  greatness 

higher  than  Macbeth's,  does  not  this  (it  may  be  asked)  impel 

Macbeth  to  the  murder  of  his  rival  ?     We  have  his  whole  feeHng 

unveiled  in  sohloquy.^  ^     r        •    ti 

Our  fears  m  Banquo 

Stick  deep ;  and  in  his  royalty  of  nature 

Reigns  that  which  would  be  fear'd ;  'tis  much  he  dares  ; 

And,  to  that  dauntless  temper  of  his  mind, 

He  hath  a  wisdom  that  doth  guide  his  valour 

To  act  in  safety.     There  is  none  but  he 

Whose  being  I  do  fear :  and,  under  him, 

My  genius  is  rebuked ;  as,  it  is  said, 

Mark  Antony's  was  by  Caesar.    He  chid  the  sisters 

When  first  they  put  the  name  of  King  upon  me, 

And  bade  them  speak  to  him  :  then  prophet-like 

They  hail'd  him  father  to  a  line  of  kings. 

Macbeth  enlarges  on  this  prediction,  making  it  a  motive  in  his 
design  against  Banquo,  yet  only  one  motive  amongst  others ;  in 
the  event  itself,  as  we  have  seen,^  it  is  neither  this  nor  the  other 
sources  of  hatred  that  actually  determine  the  expedition  against 
Banquo,  but  a  sudden  emergency  in  which  Banquo's  presence  is  a 
special  danger.     When  the  apparitions  say  to  Macbeth  — 

Beware  the  thane  of  Fife : 

he  instantly  answers  — 

Thou  has  harp'd  ray  fear  aright. 

Does  not  the  oracle  about  Birnam  Wood  affect  Macbeth's  action, 
by  leading  him  to  shut  himself  up  in  Dunsinane  Castle  ?  Appar- 
ently it  does  ;  but  Macbeth's  description  of  that  fortress — 

Our  castle's  strength 
Will  laugh  a  siege  to  scorn :  here  let  them  lie 
Till  famine  and  the  ague  eat  them  up  — 

1  Above,  pages  251-252.  2  Macbeth  :  III.  i.  49.  «  Above,  pages  258-259. 


308  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

suggests  that  in  any  case  this  would  have  been  the  position  in 
which  he  would  have  awaited  an  invading  army.  The  promise  of 
safety  against  all  born  of  women  might  have  been  expected  to  set 
Macbeth's  mind  at  ease ;  on  the  contrary,  he  surrounds  himself 
v/ith  just  the  same  reign  of  terror  that  other  tryants  use  who  have 
no  supernatural  backing. 

The  play  of  Hamlet  tests  our  third  principle  more  severely. 
At  first  sight  it  would  seem  that  the  intervention  of  the  Ghost 
initiates  the  whole  action  of  the  drama.  Yet  it  is  notable,  in  the 
scene  of  Hamlet  and  the  Ghost,  that  when  the  actual  point  of  the 
revelation  is  reached  — 

The  serpent  that  did  sting  thy  father's  life 
Now  wears  his  crown  — 

Hamlet  instantly  interjects — 

O  my  prophetic  soul ! 
My  uncle  ! 

Hamlet's  own  mind  had  anticipated  the  supernatural  revelation. 
This  throws  light  on  his  suspicion  of  "  foul  play,"  on  his  still  earlier 
expression  of  the  weariness  of  all  life,  which  at  the  time  seemed  out 
of  proportion  to  surrounding  circumstances.^  Hamlet's  whole 
spirit  had  been  clouded  over  with  a  vague  sense  of  horror  :  the  word 
of  the  Ghost  simply  precipitates  this  into  a  definite  thought  of 
crime.  As  the  action  proceeds  our  principle  receives  fresh  confir- 
mation. The  ghostly  visitant  with  all  his  dread  authority  imposes 
on  Hamlet  a  distinct  task  of  vengeance,  and  Hamlet  under  this 
influence  passionately  accepts  the  commission.  As  a  fact,  does 
he  act  upon  it?  He  soon  falls  back  into  sceptical  doubt  of  the 
character  of  the  apparition ;  must  lay  a  scheme  for  confirmation, 
and  gets  it  to  the  full.  Still  does  he  act  ?  He  is  passionately  re- 
solved to  act,  is  ever  reproaching  himself  for  delay ;  but  in  actual 
fact  the  supernatural  commission  is  never  fulfilled,  and  the  king  is 
slain  at  last  by  a  sudden  impulse  of  Hamlet,  prompted  by  another 
crime  that  moment  discovered. 

1  Hamlet:  I.  ii.  256,  and  whole  scene  from  line  66, 


SUPERNATURAL  AGENCY  IN   SHAKESPEARE  309 

Thus  slight  is  the  degree  of  influence  Shakespeare  admits  for 
supernatural  manifestations  :  they  cannot  deflect  men  from  a  course 
of  action,  they  can  but  give  this  a  touch  of  impetus.  The  popular 
feeling  is  that  communications  from  the  unseen  world,  if  such 
things  can  be,  must  be  most  powerful  motives  in  human  action. 
Powerful  such  supernatural  interference  would  be  in  disturbing 
the  imagination  and  the  emotions ;  but  it  is  the  regular  order  of 
natural  influences  which  alone  can  govern  action.  Shakespeare's 
treatment  of  the  supernatural  is  but  a  comment  on  the  text :  If 
they  hear  not  Moses  and  the  Prophets,  neither  will  they  be 
persuaded  though  one  rose  from  the  dead. 

One  doubt  remains :  if  so  little  is  permitted  to  supernatural 
agency,  was  it  worth  while  to  introduce  it  at  all  ?  In  reality,  the 
function  of  the  supernatural  in  Shakespeare  is  most  important; 
but  it  is  a  function  addressed,  not  to  the  persons  in  the  story,  but 
to  the  spectator  of  the  drama.  Shakespeare  inherits  from  ancient 
literature  the  whole  conception  of  Destiny.  This  Destiny  found 
expression  in  the  Classical  Drama  chiefly  in  the  form  of  the 
*  oracular  action  ' :  a  mysterious  oracle  of  the  future  is  gradually 
cleared  up  in  meaning  as  it  is  gradually  fulfilled.  Shakespeare 
retains  enough  of  the  supernatural  to  make  possible  this  oracular 
action  in  a  plot,  but  rejects  the  idea  of  Destiny  as  a  force  control- 
ling events.  All  that  is  necessary  for  the  dramatic  effect  is 
foreknowledge.  Even  in  sober  prose  a  succession  of  commonplace 
incidents  can  be  vividly  interesting  when,  at  the  end,  the  historian 
brings  out  the  principle  underlying  the  incidents.  Drama  must  go 
beyond  history,  and  borrows  enough  of  the  supernatural  to  make 
the  future  issues  send  a  flash-light  into  the  events  while  still  in 
progress.  Seen  in  this  light  of  a  known  future,  the  course  of 
events,  though  natural  and  regular,  is  imbued  with  some  strange 
colour.  There  is  the  colour  of  mystery.  Birnam  Wood  moving 
to  Dunsinane  Castle  :  how  is  it  possible?  Curiosity  is  prolonged 
until,  in  the  most  unexpected  yet  intelligible  action  of  an  army 
knowing  nothing  of  the  prediction,  the  impossible  has  become  an 
accomplished  fact.     Or,  there  is  the  colour  of  irony,  a  tinge  of 


310  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

mockery  cast  over  a  succession  of  events.  The  supernatural  has 
proclaimed  that  Macbeth  shall  be  king.  But  to  this  kingship,  not 
in  itself  improbable,  we  the  spectators  see  a  formidable  obstacle 
arise  —  the  proclamation  of  an  heir  apparent ;  when  we  further  see 
that  this  proclamation  leads  Macbeth  to  take  up  again  the  treason 
he  had  dropped,  when  the  obstacle  in  the  way  of  the  prediction  is 
thus  converted  into  a  step  toward  its  fulfilment,  we  seem  to  catch 
a  spirit  of  mockery  in  the  natural  course  of  history.  Again  and 
again  the  effect  is  repeated.  Duncan's  son  and  heir  has  escaped 
when  his  father  is  murdered,  but  this  flight  of  the  son  diverts 
public  suspicion  from  Macbeth  to  himself,  and  Macbeth  is  pro- 
claimed king.  Macbeth  is  supernaturally  guaranteed  against  all 
not  born  of  women,  yet  is  bidden  beware  the  thane  of  Fife.  As 
an  extra  precaution  Macbeth  sends  out  to  destroy  this  thane  and 
his  whole  family.  We  the  spectators  are  allowed  to  see  the  thane 
of  Fife  —  the  man  not  born  of  woman  —  just  about  to  give  up  his 
vengeance  and  quit  his  country,  when  the  news  of  the  raid,  that 
destroyed  all  his  family  but  missed  himself,  brings  him  back  to  the 
mission  which  none  can  accompUsh  but  himself.^  Every  single 
detail  is  rational  and  intelligible  :  but  in  the  light  of  the  predicted 
future  the  succession  of  details  seems  to  be  a  mocking  conspiracy. 
To  sum  up.  Supernatural  agency  has  a  place  in  the  world  of 
Shakespeare.  Among  the  forces  of  life,  it  has  no  power  except 
to  accentuate  what  already  exists;  but  it  has  great  power  to 
illuminate  life  for  those  who  are  life's  spectators.  To  express  a 
principle  of  drama  in  language  of  the  theatre  :  On  the  stage  of 
human  Hfe  man  is  the  only  actor;  to  supernatural  agency  it  is 
given  to  manoeuvre  the  footlights. 

'^Macbeth:  IV.  iii,  from  iii. 


XV 

MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND  OVERRULING  PROVIDENCE 

In  an  earlier  chapter  of  this  book  we  have  seen  that  accident  is 
to  be  reckoned  among  the  things  that  determine  issues  in  human 
life.  We  saw  the  story  of  Romeo  and  Juliet  as  permeated  with 
the  accidental ;  its  great  turning-point  —  the  friar  messenger 
stopped  at  the  door  of  the  infected  house  —  is  a  piece  of  pure 
chance  that  is  efficient  cause  of  a  triple  tragedy.  Similar  cases 
abound  in  other  plays.  In  The  Cotnedy  of  Errors  the  maze  of 
cross  purposes  follows  by  natural  sequence  from  the  original  situa- 
tion, and  might  well  bring  the  various  parties  concerned  to  the 
priory ;  but  it  is  an  accident  that  they  appear  just  as  the  proces- 
sion of  ^geon  to  his  execution  is  passing ;  five  minutes  difference 
either  way  would  have  made  the  comedy  into  a  tragedy.  In 
Mtich  Ado  about  Nothing  the  natural  thing  for  the  Watch  to  do 
is,  not  to  arrest  prisoners,  but  to  "  go  sit  here  on  the  church-bench 
till  two,  and  then  to  bed."  By  accident  they  overhear  a  conversa- 
tion they  do  not  understand,  and  arrest  an  important  personage 
without  knowing  it,  taking  him  for  an  accomplice  of  the  thief 
Deformed ;  then  accident  is  multiplied  into  accident  as,  when 
they  bring  their  prisoner  before  tl^e  governor,  'Leonato's  patience 
gives  out,  and  he  devolves  the  examination,  just  before  he  would 
have  heard  what  would  have  saved  his  own  daughter  from  public 
shame.  The  Outlaws  in  The  Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona  are  not 
a  blockading  force  who  stop  all  travellers  leaving  Milan ;  yet  they 
happen  to  stop,  first  Valentine,  then  in  succession  all  the  person- 
ages associated  with  his  story,  whose  presence  upon  one  and  the 
same  spot  is  the  only  thing  necessary  to  resolve  a  complicated 
situation.     And  a  play  like  Cymbeline  has  a  vein  of  accident  mn- 

3" 


312  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

ning  right  through  it :  that  Imogen  in  her  wanderings  should  find 
the  cave  where  her  lost  brothers  live,  that  the  poison,  given 
as  a  precious  drug  to  Pisanio,  should  be  transferred  innocently 
to  his  mistress  and  tasted  when  she  is  alone  in  the  cave,  that 
she  should  be  buried  just  where  the  march  of  the  Roman  army- 
should  encounter  her  on  waking  from  her  trance  —  these  and  the 
Uke  make  a  chain  of  coincidences,  not  of  cause  and  effect,  and 
assist  us  to  realise- how  much  in  life  of  the  actual  rests  upon  the 
casual. 

It  need  cause  no  difficulty  that  the  word  *  accident '  as  here 
used  admits  of  no  precise  definition.  We  are  reminded  of  the 
old  logical  Fallacy  of  the  Sorites,  which  would  fain  question  the 
existence  of  a  heap  of  corn,  on  the  ground  that  no  one  could 
determine  how  many  ears  of  corn  would  have  to  be  removed  before 
it  ceased  to  be  a  heap.  It  is  not  by  any  amount  of  the  unforeseen 
and  unexpected,  less  or  more,  that  an  event  is  made  into  an  acci- 
dent. Life  is  full  of  the  unexpected ;  a  man  who  has  no  resource 
to  meet  what  has  not  been  foreseen  lacks  an  important  part  of  the 
equipment  of  Hfe,  and  must  expect  to  suffer  accordingly.  I  have 
ventured  to  use  the  term  *  moral  accident.'  In  the  external  uni- 
verse we  may  make  it  a  postulate  that  everything  shall  be  deemed 
to  have  a  cause ;  the  moral  world,  on  the  contrary,  concerns  in- 
dividual lives,  and  there  must  be  many  things  determining  the  fate 
of  an  individual  which  are  nevertheless  entirely  outside  his  control, 
which  appear  therefore  in  his  moral  field  as  causeless.  It  is  thus 
not  any  analytic  quahty  of  the  circumstance  itself,  but  some  rela- 
tion between  circumstances  and  personality,  that  makes  the  basis 
of  moral  accident.  We  must  not  call  the  arrival  of  the  Players  in 
Hamlet  an  accident ;  true,  he  was  not  expecting  them,  but  their 
coming  was  a  natural  part  of  court  life  ;  if  they  had  not  appeared, 
some  other  device  would  have  been  used  by  the  prince  to  make 
his  test  of  the  King.  It  is  otherwise  with  the  incident  of  the 
Pirates  in  the  same  play.  Possibly  the  marine  insurance  of  the 
times  would  recognise  piracy  among  its  risks;  but  that  pirates 
should  attack  this  particular  ship,  that  in  boarding  Hamlet  should 


MORAL  ACaDENT  AND  OVERRULING  PROVIDENCE    313 

be  the  only  man  borne  off,  that  this  should  upset  entirely  the  well- 
laid  plan  of  the  King  and  alter  Hamlet's  whole  future  —  here  is 
the  combination  of  fateful  circumstances  making  a  moral  accident. 
It  is  instructive  to  consider  in  this  hght  the  slaying  of  Polonius. 
From  Hamlet's  point  of  view  there  is  in  this  nothing  accidental ; 
it  is  just  in  accordance  with  his  character  to  strike  while  the  iron 
is  hot,  and  to  be  benumbed  by  the  time  of  coohng.  But  from  the 
standpoint  of  Polonius  this  small  piece  of  harmless  fussiness  setting 
in  motion  such  a  ponderous  force  of  reaction  goes  beyond  the 
bounds  of  cause  and  effect,  and  sinks  into  the  accidental.  Thus 
the  same  incident  may  be  a  moral  accident  to  one  of  the  persons 
concerned  in  it,  not  to  another. 

Shakespeare's  most  elaborate  treatment  of  accident  is  in  The 
Merchant  of  Venice.  But  in  approaching  this  masterpiece  it  is 
necessary  to  protest  against  the  confusion  introduced  into  its 
analysis  by  modern  attempts  to  clear  Shakespeare  from  the  charge 
of  intolerance.  We  have  grown  ashamed  of  the  spirit  of  per- 
secution with  which  mediaeval  Christianity  visited  a  people  in 
some  respects  —  notably  in  finance  —  representing  a  higher  civil- 
isation than  its  own.  Attempt  is  made  to  suggest  that  Shake.- 
speare  was  above  this.  Stress  is  laid  upon  such  passages  as 
this. 

Shylock.     Signior  Antonio,  many  a  time  and  oft 
In  the  Rialto  you  have  rated  me 
About  my  moneys  and  my  usances : 
Still  have  I  borne  it  with  a  patient  shrug, 
For  sufferance  is  the  badge  of  all  our  tribe. 
You  call  me  misbeliever,  cut-throat  dog, 
And  spit  upon  my  Jewish  gaberdine, 
And  all  for  use  of  that  which  is  mine  own. 
Well  then,  it  now  appears  you  need  my  help : 
Go  to,  then ;  you  come  to  me,  and  you  say 
'Shylock,  we  would  have  moneys  : '  you  say  so ; 
You,  that  did  void  your  rheum  upon  my  beard 
And  foot  me  as  you  spurn  a  stranger  cur 
Over  your  threshold  :  moneys  is  your  suit.  .  .  . 


314  THE   MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

Antonio,    I  am  as  like  to  call  thee  so  again, 

To  spit  on  thee  again,  to  spurn  thee  too. 

If  thou  wilt  lend  this  money,  lend  it  not 

As  to  thy  friends ;  for  when  did  friendship  take 

A  breed  for  barren  metal  of  his  friend? 

But  lend  it  rather  to  thine  enemy, 

Who,  if  he  break,  thou  mayst  with  better  face 

Exact  the  penalty. 

The  suggestion  is  that  Shakespeare  is  enlisting  sympathy  for  the 
oppressed  Jews;  that  the  arrogant  intolerance  of  Antonio  is  the 
error  on  which  the  peril  of  his  hfe  is  soon  to  come  down  as  a  judg- 
ment. I  should  be  only  too  glad  on  this  point  to  be  convinced ; 
but  I  am  bound  to  say  that  there  appears  to  me  not  a  shred  of 
support  in  the  whole  play  for  this  interpretation.  Antonio  is  rep- 
resented as  the  most  ideal  of  characters,  and  his  intolerance  is 
part  of  his  perfection  —  an  uncompromising  hatred  of  what  (ac- 
cording to  the  spirit  of  the  times)  ought  to  be  hated.  When  the 
Christian  merchant  is  brought  low,  neither  by  himself  nor  by  others 
is  there  any  recognition  of  rebuked  pride ;  on  the  contrary,  it  is 
as  a  martyr  that  Antonio  suffers. 

Antonio.    He  seeks  my  life ;  his  reason  well  I  know : 
I  oft  deliver'd  from  his  forfeitures 
Many  that  have  at  times  made  moan  to  me ; 
Therefore  he  hates  me. 

When  Antonio  has  triumphed,  he  couples  his  '  mercy '  to  Shylock 
with  the  condition  that  Shylock  shall  become  a  Christian,  which 
the  court  confirms  as  if  it  were  a  matter  of  course.  All  this  is  in 
full  accord  with  the  mediaeval  feud  of  Jew  and  Christian.  It  is 
true  that,  in  the  passage  quoted  above  and  in  other  passages, 
sympathy  is  being  enlisted  with  the  wrongs  of  Shylock ;  but  for 
what  purpose?  The  traditional  Story  of  the  Pound  of  Flesh  in- 
volves a  malice  so  hideously  inhuman  that  it  becomes  difficult  to 
conceive ;  the  dramatist  emphasises  the  wrongs  done  to  Shylock 
as  so  many  incentives  to  revenge,  helping  to  make  the  particular 


MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND   OVERRULING   PROVIDENCE     315 

revenge  taken  less  incredible.  Of  course,  it  is  always  right  to 
sympathise  with  trouble  and  to  be  indignant  at  the  sight  of  wrong ; 
but  sympathy  should  not  be  confused  with  partisanship.  It  may 
be  well  to  drop  a  tear  over  Shylock  staggering  dazed  out  of  the 
court  to  go  to  his  lonely  home;  but  it  should  not  be  forgotten 
that  even  this  is  a  slighter  ruin  than  the  fate  which,  only  a  few 
minutes  before,  Shylock  was  clamoring  to  inflict  upon  his  adver- 
sary. The  sentimentalism  that  would  make  Shylock  the  real  hero 
of  The  Merchant  of  Venice  savours  of  the  little  child's  remark  on 
the  famous  painting  of  the  martyrs  cast  to  lions  —  that  there  was 
one  poor  little  lion  that  had  not  got  a  martyr. 

With  this  prejudice  cleared  out  of  the  way,  we  can  do  justice  to 
the  elaborate  plot  of  the  play.^  In  the  main  story  we  have,  not 
simply  a  Christian  and  a  Jew,  but  a  supremely  noble  Christian  and 
a  supremely  base  Jew.  Antonio  is  a  combination  of  dignified 
strength  with  almost  womanly  tenderness  towards  his  young  friend 
Bassanio ;  all  in  the  play  feel  the  greatness  of  this  character,  not 
the  least  of  them  the  incomparable  Portia.  Shylock  is  —  what 
the  traditional  story  requires  —  a  monster  of  cruelty  and  greed  in 
his  public  Ufe ;  in  private,  we  have  his  daughter's  authority  for  it 
that  his  house  is  a  hell.^  Yet  the  course  of  events  is  such  that  this 
supremely  noble  Christian  is  helplessly  at  the  mercy  of  the  base 
Jew ;  and  how  has  it  been  brought  about  ?  By  the  most  extreme 
example  of  the  accidental  ever  imagined  in  fiction.  It  would  have 
been  a  remarkable  accident  if  all  Antonio's  ships  had  been  wrecked, 
so  vast  is  his  enterprise,  and  so  prudent  is  he  in  distributing  risks. 
But  as  a  fact,  not  a  single  ship  miscarries :  yet  the  merchant  him- 
self, his  creditors,  his  friends,  the  business  world,  all  act  upon  the  be- 
lief that  all  the  ventures  are  lost,  and  this  in  a  matter  of  bankruptcy 
and  of  life  and  death.  If  an  accidental  occurrence  seems  almost 
too  slight  a  motive  for  dramatic  action,  how  infinitely  slight  and 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  page  347.  The 
Merchant  of  Venice  is  discussed  in  detail  in  Chapters  I  to  III  of  my  Shakespeare 
as  a  DramcUic  Artist. 

2  Merchant  0/  Venice :  II.  iii.  2, 


3l6  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

nebulous  must  seem  a  concatenation  of  false  rumours  of  accident. 
But  all  this  is  only  half  the  story.  In  the  other  half  the  wheel 
goes  round,  and  it  is  the  Jew  who  is  helpless  before  his  Christian 
adversary  :  and  how  has  this  come  to  pass  ?  Shakespeare  keeps 
up  the  traditional  story,  which  overthrows  the  bond  because  it 
contains  no  provision  for  shedding  of  blood ;  but  he  puts  this  plea 
in  the  mouth  of  a  girl.  The  real  legal  plea  is  added  afterwards, 
common  sense  coming  to  buttress  up  the  picturesque  :  Portia  has 
consulted  with  the  learned  Bellario,  who  supplies  her  with  the  fact 
that  there  is  a  statute  making  Shylock's  proposal  of  the  bond  a 
capital  offence.^  The  extraordinary  thing  is  that  neither  Antonio 
and  his  well-paid  advisers,  nor  the  Jews  to  whom  the  law  meant  so 
much,  nor  the  court  of  Venice  which  seems  to  have  taken  counsel's 
opinion  on  its  own  account,^  should  have  known  of  this  Statute  of 
Aliens,  dug  out  of  the  dust  heap  of  forgotten  legislation  by  a  sin- 
gle exceptional  pundit.  The  reversal  of  the  action,  as  well  as  the 
earUer  phase  of  it,  rests  upon  a  hair's-breadth  chance.  The  whole 
story  takes  unity  as  the  exhibition,  in  twofold  form,  of  character 
wholly  under  the  dominion  of  accident. 

With  this  story  of  the  Jew  the  plot  of  The  Merchant  of  Venice 
interweaves  the  story  of  the  Caskets.  A  father  with  a  vast  fortune 
and  a  precious  daughter  to  dispose  of  rests  the  possession  of  both 
on  a  choice  between  caskets  ;  for  ground  of  choice  there  is  nothing 
but  the  three  metals  and  the  three  mottoes ;  each  is  a  precarious 
guide,  the  combination  of  the  two  dissipates  precarious  indication 
into  pure  chance.  We  have  thus  an  elaborately  contrived  accident 
as  the  essence  of  the  situation.  It  has  been  noted  in  an  earlier 
chapter  ^  what  ensues :  suitors  go  honestly  through  trains  of 
reasoning  in  an  irrational  issue,  but  the  spectator  sees  how  the 
whole  character  of  each  suitor  determines  his  choice,  making 
Morocco  lean  to  gold,  Arragon  to  desert,  the  true  lover  Bassanio 
to  hazarding  in  preference  to  receiving.  The  problem  of  the 
accidental  has  been  solved  by  force  of  character.     And  the  whole 

'^Merchant  of  Venice :  IV.  i,  from  347.  2  Merchant  of  Venice :  IV.  i.  104. 

8  Above,  pages  245-246. 


MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND   OVERRULING  PROVIDENCE    317 

plot  of  the  drama  thus  balances  before  our  eyes,  in  parallel  move- 
ments :  on  the  one  side  character  at  the  mercy  of  accident,  on  the 
other  side  accident  wholly  dominated  by  character. 

So  methodical  a  treatment  of  accident  as  this  play  affords  leads 
us  naturally  to  a  further  step  in  our  survey  of  the  subject.  So 
far  we  have  considered  accident  only  negatively :  its  recognition 
saves  us  from  seeking  to  make  such  principles  as  retribution 
universal,  and  so  degrading  the  moral  into  the  mechanical.  But 
may  it  be  possible  to  read  a  more  positive  significance  into  the 
accidental,  and  give  it  a  more  definite  place  in  a  moral  system? 

The  question  at  once  puts  us  in  touch  with  a  venerable  specula- 
tion of  popular  thought.  When  a  modern  reader  appHes  himself 
to  the  life  and  literature  of  Greek  antiquity,  perhaps  nothing  im- 
presses him  more  at  first  than  the  wide  acceptance  of  the  omen 
and  the  influence  of  mantic  art.  In  profundity  and  subtlety  of 
intellect  the  Greek  is  at  least  the  equal  of  the  modern  mind.  Yet 
this  wise  people  is  seen,  in  the  regulation  of  daily  life,  to  give 
anxious  attention  to  things  which  a  modern  observer  can  only 
regard  as  flimsy  puerilities.  If  a  beast  is  slain  for  a  sacrificial 
feast,  the  entrails  are  carefully  inspected;  their  normal  or  ab- 
normal appearance,  or  the  kind  of  sputtering  they  make  in  the 
fire,  is  accepted  as  indication  of  good  fortune  or  evil  to  come. 
The  movement  of  flickering  flame  is  precisely  marked ;  observa- 
tories are  built  for  studying  the  zigzag  darting  of  flying  birds ;  the 
exact  itinerary  of  the  wayward  lightning  flash  is  a  question  of  im- 
portance ;  it  makes  a  difference  whether  the  sudden  thunder  clap 
was  heard  on  the  right  side  or  on  the  left ;  a  sneeze,  a  bodily 
convulsion,  a  chance  word  of  greeting,  a  stumble  over  a  threshold 
—  all  these  may  be  ominous  of  futurity.  Now,  it  will  be  noted 
that  the  one  element  common  to  all  these  diff"erent  kinds  of  omen 
is  the  purely  accidental  nature  of  the  thing  observed.  Greek 
subtlety  has  seized  upon  what  is  furthest  removed  from  orderly 
habit  and  regularity  of  occurrence,  and  to  this  it  looks  for  tokens 
from  the  Supreme.  For  that  portion  of  the  universe  which  mani- 
fests itself  in  the  form  of  law  is  limited  by  law ;  if  the  higher  will 


3l8  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

is  ever  to  indicate  itself  it  must  be  by  using  some  machinery  that 
is  outside  the  course  of  law.  The  philosophy  of  the  omen  is  that 
accident  is  the  only  possible  revelation  of  Destiny. 

A  similar  conception  enters  into  modern  thought,  though  of 
course  it  finds  very  different  degrees  of  acceptance  in  different 
minds.  A  man  sets  out  for  the  train  by  which  he  goes  every  day 
to  the  city ;  he  turns  back  because  he  has  forgotten  his  pocket- 
handkerchief  ;  he  thereby  misses  his  train  by  just  half  a  minute ; 
the  train  is  wrecked  and  many  are  killed.  Instantly  the  man  is 
conscious  of  a  supreme  will  in  the  universe,  and  that  it  has  inter- 
fered for  his  protection.  Suppose  that  the  individual  in  question 
had  been  possessed  of  a  peculiar  sensitiveness  to  magnetic  condi- 
tions of  the  atmosphere,  that  on  this  particular  morning  the  air 
struck  him  as  in  an  abnormal  condition  favorable  to  snapping  of 
axles  or  rails,  and  that  on  this  account  he  postponed  his  journey : 
then  the  subsequent  wreck  would  have  raised  no  thoughts  in  the 
man's  mind  beyond  the  beauty  of  the  science  of  magnetics.  It 
was  the  purely  accidental  character  of  what  occurred  —  the  trifle 
of  a  forgotten  handkerchief  saving  a  life  —  that  kindled  the  con- 
ception of  a  special  providence ;  and  it  was  not  for  the  man  in  the 
excitement  of  a  personal  revelation  to  trouble  himself  with  the 
question  of  the  other  people  who  remembered  their  handkerchiefs 
and  were  killed. 

In  ancient  and  modem  thought  alike  then  there  is  at  least 
a  tendency  to  associate  accident  with  supreme  providence ;  not 
indeed  the  providence  of  everyday  Hfe,  which  reveals  itself  in 
the  form  of  regular  and  orderly  law,  but  what  may  be  called  Over- 
ruling Providence  —  the  supreme  power  of  the  universe  acting 
outside  law.  The  idea  of  course  is  not  that  all  apparent  accidents 
are  so  to  be  interpreted ;  but  that,  if  providential  power  other 
than  regular  law  is  to  act  at  all,  it  is  only  in  the  form  of  the  acci- 
dental that  it  can  manifest  itself. 

Shakespeare's  great  treatment  of  this  particular  aspect  of  his 
moral  system  is  the  play  of  Hamlet.  In  this  perplexing  and  diffi- 
cult plot  we  have  at  all  events  the  assistance  of  an  interpretation 


MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND  OVERRULING  PROVIDENCE    3 19 

coming  from  the  poem  itself.  Horatio,  Hamlet's  confidant  all 
through,  is  deputed  by  the  dying  prince  to  read  the  lesson  of  the 
whole  story.  We  never  hear  Horatio's  explanation ;  but  the  sum- 
mary he  makes  of  what  he  is  to  say  is  itself  instructive. 

And  let  me  speak  to  the  yet  unknowing  world 

How  these  things  came  about :  so  shall  you  hear 

Of  carnal,  bloody,  and  unnatural  acts. 

Of  accidental  judgements,  casual  slaughters, 

Of  deaths  put  on  by  cunning  and  forced  cause, 

And,  in  this  upshot,  purposes  mistook 

Fall'n  on  the  inventors'  heads. ^ 

Evidently  the  association  of  accident  and  overruling  providence 
is  a  main  thought  of  Horatio's  homily ;  and  the  facts  of  the  play 
fully  support  this  interpretation. 

In  the  main  plot^  of  Hamlet  (as  in  Cymbeline)  we  can  note  a 
system  of  graded  wrong,  with  appropriate  nemesis  and  pathos ; 
but  in  each  single  case  there  is  the  intervention  of  accident.  At 
one  end  of  the  scale  we  have  the  gross  crime  of  the  King  —  mur- 
der of  a  brother  and  King  to  gain  the  brother's  wife  and  kingdom. 
Eventually  due  retribution  comes  from  the  natural  avenger  of  blood. 
Yet,  although  the  murdered  father  comes  from  his  grave  to  stir  up 
his  son  and  avenger,  Hamlet  is  seen  to  hesitate  and  delay,  is  for 
ever  on  the  verge  of  avenging  and  yet  stops  short :  until  accident 
intervenes  in  the  circumstance  of  the  poison  prepared  by  the  King 
for  Hamlet  being  tasted  by  the  Queen.  Then  the  full  nemesis 
descends  :  the  King  has  just  time  to  see  himself  the  murderer  of 
the  woman  he  loves,  and  then  falls  at  the  hand  of  his  brother's 
avenger.  Next,  we  have  the  lesser  crime  of  the  Queen  :  yet  crime 
we  must  call  it,  for  the  imphcation  of  the  whole  story  is  a  guilty 
love  while  her  first  husband  is  yet  alive.  Nemesis  overtakes  her, 
as  she  meets  her  death  from  her  lover's  hand  :  yet  by  accident,  for 
the  death  was  meant  for  her  son,  and  —  to  add  pathos  to  her  fall  — 

1  Hamlet :  V.  ii.  390. 

2  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  in  the  Appendix  below,  page  364. 


320  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

it  was  anxiety  over  the  position  of  this  well-loved  son  that  made 
the  thirst  so  fatally  quenched.  We  now  pass  outside  crime,  to 
what  is  merely  unwisdom.  The  wrong  of  Polonius  amounts  to  no 
more  than  politic  intermeddhng ;  and  he  meets  a  meddler's  fate 
—  yet  by  accident,  a  fate  intended  for  another. 

Thou  wretched,  rash,  intruding  fool,  farewell! 
I  took  thee  for  thy  better :  take  thy  fortune ; 
Thou  find'st  to  be  too  busy  is  some  danger. 

Much  the  same  may  be  said  of  Rosencrantz  and  Guildenstern. 

They  are  not  near  my  conscience ;  their  defeat 
Does  by  their  own  insinuation  grow  : 
'Tis  dangerous  when  the  baser  nature  comes 
Between  the  pass  and  fell  incensed  points 
Of  mighty  opposites. 

Their  nemesis  is  to  go  unconsciously  to  the  doom  to  which  they 
were  assisting  Hamlet.  And  it  is  accident  that  has  so  decreed  : 
the  accident  is  one  of  those  strange,  unaccountable  impressions 
that  sometimes  come  upon  a  man,  so  that  he  feels  irrational  in 
acting  on  them,  and  yet  in  the  sequel  finds  overpowering  justifica- 
tion. If  it  seems  to  be  straining  this  word  accident  to  extend  it  so 
far,  I  can  only  say  that  it  is  Hamlet  himself  who  is  responsible  for 
the  interpretation.  With  these  words  he  introduces  his  story  of 
the  feeling  which  prompted  him  to  open  the  sealed  packet. 

Sir,  in  my  heart  there  was  a  kind  of  fighting, 

That  would  not  let  me  sleep  :  methought  I  lay 

Worse  than  the  mutines  in  the  bilboes.     Rashly, 

And  praised  be  rashness  for  it,  let  us  know. 

Our  indiscretion  sometimes  serves  us  well. 

When  our  deep  plots  do  pall ;  and  that  should  teach  us 

There's  a  divinity  that  shapes  our  ends. 

Rough-hew  them  how  we  will.^ 

Of  Ophelia  the  only  evil  is  that  she  is  not  strong  enough  for  the 
situation  in  which   she  finds  herself;  gifted  with  clearer  insight 

1  Hamlet :  V.  ii.  4,  and  whole  scene. 


MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND  OVERRULING  PROVIDENCE     32 1 

than  that  of  others  around  her,  the  force  of  maidenly  tradition 
checks  her  from  acting  on  her  instincts  as  to  Hamlet.  It  is 
simple  love  yielding  to  unfavourable  circumstances;  and  the 
agony  that  follows  brings  Ophelia  to  pathetic  doom,  and  yet  a 
doom  which  only  the  accidental  breaking  of  a  tree  bough  made 
irremediable.  As  OpheHa  appears  a  type  of  simple  love,  so 
Laertes  represents  simple  sense  of  duty  —  to  avenge  a  father's 
slaughter.  Yet  Laertes,  like  his  sister,  yields  to  circumstances,  and 
is  persuaded  to  exchange  the  public  demand  of  justice  for  the  fine 
scheme  of  private  revenge  :^  accident  once  more  intervenes,  and  — 
in  the  extraordinary  shuffling  of  the  foils  —  Laertes  is  pierced  with 
the  poisoned  weapon  he  intended  for  another. 

Six  times  has  the  retributive  principle  in  the  universe  asserted 
itself,  and  six  times  it  has  been  an  "  accidental  judgement."  But 
in  the  wide  field  of  action  thus  displayed  what  has  been  the  motive 
force  ?  Nothing  but  the  character  of  the  hero,  the  peculiar  char- 
acter of  Hamlet.  He  is  the  great  type  of  the  inner  hfe  preponder- 
ating over  the  life  without.  Above  all  things  Hamlet  is  the  man  of 
introspection ;  his  luminous  subtlety  in  self-analysis  has  made  this 
the  classical  poem  of  soul  philosophy.  His  agile  mind-play 
extending  over  the  whole  field  of  intellect  and  emotion  enables  him 
at  will  to  assume  even  distraction,  and  use  it  as  a  stalking  horse 
for  his  designs.  But  the  moment  Hamlet  essays  to  act  in  the 
common  world  of  men  his  emotional  strength  dissipates  into 
sceptical  indecision  ;  newer  and  ever  newer  trains  of  thought  about 
acting  exhaust  the  energy  to  act.  The  tragedy  of  Hamlet  is  that 
to  the  ideal  man  of  the  life  within  is  intrusted  a  bold  enterprise  of 
the  life  without.  How  the  Ghost's  commission  would  have  been 
executed  if  confided  to  a  Macbeth  or  an  Antony  it  is  easy  to 
imagine  :  the  guilty  King  would  have  fallen  by  a  single  telling  blow, 
and  justice  would  have  been  satisfied.  But  as  it  is,  the  tentative 
hesitation  of  Hamlet  enlarges  the  area  of  wrong ;  for  all  the  evil 
and  ruin  of  the  play  —  except  the  original  crime  that  precedes  the 
rise  of  the  curtain  —  the  delay  of  Hamlet  is  the  occasion.      And 

'^Hamlet:  IV.  vii,  from  60. 
Y 


322  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

at  last  a  sudden  flash  of  action  on  Hamlet's  part  puts  the  finishing 
stroke  to  the  whole  tragedy.  But  this  sudden  determination  seems 
possible  for  Hamlet  only  in  the  face  of  accident :  of  that  twofold 
revelation  of  accident,  that  in  a  moment  showed  him  the  poisoned 
foil  slaying  the  slayer  as  well  as  the  victim,  the  poisoned  drink 
intended  for  the  enemy  slaying  the  poisoner's  beloved  queen. 

The  whole  play  of  Hamlet  is  a  rich  blend  of  three  elements : 
character,  accident,  nemesis,  are  here  all  interwoven.^  And  the 
sense  of  overruhng  providence  to  which  such  cooperation  points 
has  never  been  more  aptly  phrased  than  in  the  famous  saying  of 

Hamlet  — 

There's  a  divinity  that  shapes  our  ends, 
Rough-hew  them  how  we  will. 

These  moral  accidents  are  sudden  openings  into  the  unknown, 
giving  us  scattered  intimations  of  a  supreme  Power  behind  the 
visible  course  of  things,  overruling  all.  Can  Shakespeare  go 
further,  and  afford  us  any  revelation  of  the  supreme  Power  itself? 
The  Shakespearean  Drama  does  not,  like  Job  or  Faust,  give  us 
a  Council  in  Heaven,  with  Deity  expounding  his  own  purposes. 
Nor  does  it,  Hke  the  Passion-Play  of  Ober-Ammergau,  present 
Deity  descended  to  earth,  exhibiting  itself  in  human  form  and 
human  action.  But  there  is  a  third  alternative  :  to  display  human- 
ity ascending,  not  indeed  into  heaven,  but  at  least  to  the  position 
of  an  overruling  providence.  "  If  I  were  God  —  "  :  there  is  noth- 
ing irreverent  in  the  fancy,  and  such  a  speculation,  carried  into 
detail,  will  bring  the  providential  control  of  the  universe  home  to 
our  minds  .through  our  imagination  and  our  sympathies.  Now 
this  is  precisely  the  idea  underlying  Shakespeare's  play  of  The 
Tempest.  As  remarked  before,  this  is  not  a  play  of  real  life; 
Shakespeare  assumes  the  hypothesis  of  enchantment.  Enchant- 
ment is,  within  the  enchanted  circle,  omnipotence;  Prospero  is, 
for  the  enchanted  island,  and  for  the  single  day  during  which  his 
spells  have  force,  a  supreme  controller  of  events.    Accordingly, 

1  Compare  the  scheme  of  the  play  below,  page  364. 


MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND  OVERRULING   PROVIDENCE     323 

as  we  follow  the  course  of  the  poem,  we  are  watching  in  dramatic 
presentation  the  mind  of  an  overruling  providence. 

I  have  elsewhere  treated  in  detail  The  Tempest  as  a  study  of 
personal  providence.^  A  few  points  only  need  be  instanced  here. 
Our  first  sign  of  providential  control  is  the  tempest  itself,  which  is 
raised  by  Prospero  to  sweep  his  foes  within  the  circle  of  his  power, 
yet  which  is  held  in  such  restraint  that  there  is  no  harm  — 

No,  not  so  much  perdition  as  an  hair 

Betid  to  any  creature  in  the  vessel 

Which  thou  heardst  cry,  which  thou  saw'st  sink. 

Here  is  a  hint  of  the  great  mystery  of  providence,  by  which  the 
course  of  the  objective  world,  common  to  all,  can  yet  be  made  to 
work  high  purposes  in  the  subjective  lives  of  single  individuals. 
After  a  back  glance  into  the  past,  in  which  the  providential  work 
of  mercy  and  judgment  has  been  (so  to  speak)  rehearsed  in  the 
control  of  the  elemental  beings  Ariel  and  Caliban,  we  have  a  new 
phase  as  Miranda,  out  of  her  charmed  sleep,  wakes  to  behold 
Ferdinand,  drawn  on  by  enchanted  music. 

Prospero.    At  the  first  sight  they  have  changed  eyes. 

What  appeared  an  accident  in  the  meeting  of  Romeo  and  Juliet, 
now  is  seen  as  the  direct  act  of  a  controlling  power.  Not  less 
suggestive  is  the  remaining  course  of  this  love  episode  : 

Prospero.  This  swift  business 

I  must  uneasy  make,  lest  too  light  winning 
Make  the  prize  light. 

What  might  be  drawn  as  a  lesson  from  a  course  of  events  at  the 
end,  is  here  at  the  beginning  made  a  providential  purpose. 

A  striking  episode  in  the  play  is  the  Conspiracy  of  Antonio  and 
Sebastian :  conscienceless  villains,  just  saved  from  the  awful  tem- 
pest, and  already  brooding  over  new  schemes  of  treason.^    Mys- 

1  In  my  Shakespeare  as  a  Dramatic  Artist,  Chapter  XII L 

2  Tempest:  II.  i,  from  191. 


1 


324  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

teriously  the  whole  train  of  courtiers,  and  the  King  himself,  are 
suddenly  locked  in  sleep ;  Antonio  and  Sebastian  are  left  wide 
awake.  With  increasing  force  the  suggestiveness  of  the  situation 
gains  upon  them ;  it  has  become  irresistible,  and  'the  two  swords 
are  being  drawn  from  their  sheaths,  when  in  a  moment  the  air  has 
become  vocal  as  the  voice  of  Ariel  warning  Gonzalo  :  the  courtiers 
spring  to  their  feet,  and  face  the  two  guilty  men,  elaborating  ex- 
cuses for  their  drawn  swords.  Thus  finely  are  touched  two  of  the 
deepest  mysteries  in  the  conception  of  providential  control :  the 
providence  of  opportunity,  that  lures  the  sinner  on  to  his  sin ; 
the  not  less  strange  providence  of  accident,  interposing  when  of 
other  salvation  there  seems  no  hope. 

For  the  central  incident  of  the  drama  we  naturally  look  when 
the  cruel  authors  of  Prospero's  expulsion  from  Milan  encounter 
their  victim  in  his  plenitude  of  omnipotence.^  A  supernatural 
banquet  invites  the  exhausted  King  and  his  courtiers ;  then,  ere 
they  can  partake,  the  banquet  vanishes  and  gives  place  to  the 
avenging  harpy,  and  the  speech  of  doom  is  heard. 

You  are  three  men  of  sin,  whom  Destiny, 
That  hath  to  instrument  this  lower  world 
And  what  is  in't,  the  never-surfeited  sea 
Hath  caused  to  belch  up  you ;  and  on  this  island 
Where  man  doth  not  inhabit ;  you  'mongst  men 
Being  most  unfit  to  live.     I  have  made  you  mad  ; 
And  even  with  such-like  valour  men  hang  and  drown 
Their  proper  selves. 

[^Alonso,  Sebastian,  etc.,  draw  their  swords. 
You  fools !  I  and  my  fellows 
Are  ministers  of  Fate  :  the  elements, 
Of  whom  your  swords  are  tempered,  may  as  well 
Wound  the  loud  winds,  or  with  bemock'd-at  stabs 
Kill  the  still-closing  waters,  as  diminish 
One  dowle  that's  in  my  plume :  my  fellow-ministers 
Are  like  invulnerable.     If  you  could  hurt, 
Your  swords  are  now  too  massy  for  your  strengths 

1  Tempest:  III.  iii. 


MORAL  ACCIDENT  AND  OVERRULING   PROVIDENCE    325 

And  will  not  be  uplifted.     But  remember  — 
For  that's  my  business  to  you  —  that  you  three 
From  Milan  did  supplant  good  Prospero  ; 
Exposed.unto  the  sea,  which  hath  requit  it, 
Him  and  his  innocent  child :  for  which  foul  deed 
The  powers,  delaying,  not  forgetting,  have 
Incensed  the  seas  and  shores,  yea,  all  the  creatures, 
Against  your  peace.     Thee  of  thy  son,  Alonso, 
They  have  bereft ;  and  do  pronounce  by  me, 
Lingering  perdition,  worse  than  any  death 
Can  be  at  once,  shall  step  by  step  attend 
You  and  your  ways  ;  whose  wraths  to  guard  you  from — 
Which  here,  in  this  most  desolate  isle,  else  falls 
Upon  your  heads  —  is  nothing  but  heart-sorrow 
And  a  clear  life  ensuing. 

Charmed  from  man's  first  instinct  of  physical  resistance,  sundered 
from  the  comforting  neighbourhood  of  fellow-men,  cut  off  from 
the  regular  course  of  nature  which  is  the  foundation  on  which 
rests  the  sense  of  security,  alone  with  their  sin  and  with  Destiny 
—  a  Destiny  whose  agencies  fill  all  space,  while  all  time  is  but 
the  delaying  which  is  no  forgetting  —  the  three  men  of  sin  have 
awakened  in  a  single  moment  to  the  whole  doom  of  lingering  per- 
dition, and  have  just  enough  sanity  left  to  know  the  sense  of  mad- 
ness. Here  is  the  Shakespearean  conception  of  hell :  but  it  is  a 
present  hell,  and  a  hell  from  which  there  is  just  one  path  of  escape, 
in  contrition  and  a  purified  Hfe. 

Omnipotence  has  put  forth  its  utmost  of  power :  with  what 
effect?  Alonso  is  seen  in  agonies  of  remorse,  the  Alonso  who 
before  he  came  within  Prospero's  enchantment  had  a  heart  to 
suffer,  who  heard  the  name  of  Prospero  in  every  thunderclap  and 
whistle  of  the  threatening  storm.^  But  Antonio  and  Sebastian,  the 
hard-hearted,  are  hardened  still  further  into  resistance. 

Sebastian.  But  one  fiend  at  a  time, 

I'll  fight  their  legions  o'er. 
Antonio.  I'll  be  thy  second.^ 

1  Compare  Tempest:  III.  iii.  95.  «  Tempest:  III.  iii.  102. 


326  THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 

The  Shakespearean  Drama  has  caught  the  spiritual  mystery :  He 
that  is  righteous,  let  him  be  righteous  still ;  and  he  that  is  filthy, 
let  him  be  filthy  still. 

There  is  yet  one  more  phase  in  this  revelation  of  personal  provi- 
dence.    Prospero's  purpose  extends  from  judgment  to  mercy. 

The  charm  dissolves  apace, 
And  as  the  morning  steals  upon  the  night, 
Melting  the  darkness,  so  their  rising  senses 
Begin  to  chase  the  ignorant  fumes  that  mantle 
Their  clearer  reason.  .  .  .    Their  understanding 
Begins  to  swell,  and  the  approaching  tide 
Will  shortly  fill  the  reasonable  shore 
That  now  lies  foul  and  muddy. 

What  ensues  gradually  unfolds  itself  as  a  universal  restoration,  em- 
bracing not  only  the  holy  Gonzalo  and  the  remorseful  Alonso,  but 
also  the  hardened  Sebastian  and  Antonio,  Caliban  the  gross,  Stephano 
the  drunken ;  it  extends  even  to  the  inanimate  things  of  nature  — 
the  ship,  that  at  the  opening  of  the  play  had  been  seen  to  burn 
and  sink,  reappearing  as  trim  as  when  she  first  left  her  dock. 

Is  this  sound  theology?  Are  its  parts  even  consistent  one  with 
the  other?  There  is  no  question  here  of  theology,  there  is  no 
question  of  soundness,  there  is  no  question  even  of  consistency. 
The  whole  is  but  the  dramatisation  of  a  fancy,  the  fancy  of  a 
human  mind  and  heart  elevated  for  a  single  day  to  the  position 
of  an  overruHng  providence.  All  the  varied  ideas  which  in  the 
past  have  impressed  thinking  minds  as  they  have  surveyed  the 
course  of  the  world  may  here  find  a  place,  without  sense  of  con- 
flict or  need  of  reconciliation.  Whatever  it  may  be,  this  specula- 
tion on  personal  providence  in  The  Tempest  makes  the  natural 
close  to  the  task  attempted  in  this  book.  The  dramatic  expres- 
sion of  the  forces  in  the  moral  world  of  Shakespeare  commences 
with  personal  will,  its  busy  intrigues,  and  their  ironic  clashings. 
It  extends  to  the  various  restraints,  from  within  and  from  without, 
which  limit  personal  will.  It  ends  with  the  conception  of  person- 
ality projected  to  the  supreme  control  of  the  universe. 


APPENDIX 

PLOT  SCHEMES  OF  SHAKESPEAREAN  DRAMAS 


PLOT   IN   SHAKESPEARE 

Dramatic  Plot  may  be  defined,  from  the  artistic  side,  as  the  concur- 
rence of  all  that  appears  in  a  drama  in  a  unity  or  harmony  of  design. 
Its  interest  is  analogous  to  that  of  geometric  drawing :  a  course  of 
events  may  be  appreciated  in  itself,  like  the  beauty  of  a  curve ;  or 
various  courses  of  events  may  be  seen  to  harmonise,  as  with  the  intri- 
cacy of  intersecting  lines  in  a  pattern.  From  the  side  of  human 
interest  it  may  be  said  that  plot  is  in  fiction  what  providence  is  for  the 
real  world  ;  every  play  is  a  microcosm,  of  which  the  poet  is  the  creator, 
and  its  plot  the  providential  scheme.  The  analysis  of  such  plot  is 
analogous  to  science,  which  takes  to  pieces  the  world  of  reality,  and 
shows  how  these  parts  combine  in  a  unity  of  evolution  or  law. 

The  founder  of  literary  criticism  was  Aristotle,  and  attempts  are  still 
made  to  adapt  his  system  to  modern  poetry.  But  Greek  drama  and 
Shakespearean  drama  are  at  opposite  ends  of  the  dramatic  scale :  the 
one  rests  upon  utter  simplicity,  the  other  upon  infinite  complexity. 
Circumstances  of  its  origin  made  Greek  tragedy  a  literary  species  by 
the  distinguishing  characteristic  of  the '  three  unities ' :  the  unity  of  action 
limited  a  play  to  a  single  story,  the  unities  of  time  and  place  still  further 
limited  the  presentation  of  this  story  to  its  crisis,  all  the  rest  of  it  being 
conveyed  indirectly.  The  romantic  drama,  on  the  contrary,  combines 
in  one  play  any  number  of  different  stories,  exhibiting  each  story  (it 
may  be)  from  beginning  to  end.  Thus  beauty  in  Greek  drama  resolves 
itself  into  this  —  how  much  can  be  kept  out :  it  rests  upon  indirect 
suggestion  and  sculpturesque  pose.  Beauty  in  romantic  drama  seeks, 
on  the  contrary,  to  get  in  all  the  matter  possible,  crowding  in  fulness 
of  picturesque  action,  yet  all  of  it  within  the  bounds  of  harmony. 
Literature  is  the  richer  for  containing  these  contrasted  types :  but  th^ 
same  plan  of  analysis  will  not  fit  both.  In  Greek  drama  plot  was  so 
simple  that  it  was  indistinguishable  from  movement  of  story.  In  the 
analysis  of  Shakespearean  drama  movement  falls  into  the  background  ; 
what  becomes  prominent  is  the  interweaving  of  different  stories,  that 
move  side  by  side  like  the  four  parts  of  musical  harmony,  with  the 
artistic  effects  of  symmetry,  balance,  contrast,  making  themselves  felt 
as  these  stories  progress.  The  interest  is  closely  akin  to  that  of 
counterpoint  in  music. 

329 


330  THE   MORAL   SYSTEM   OF   SHAKESPEARE 


The  Unit  of  Plot 

In  romantic  drama,  naturally,  the  unit  of  plot  is  the  romance  or  story. 
Thus  The  Merchant  of  Venice  takes  three  stories  from  different  books 
of  romance,  adds  to  these  a  fourth  story,  and  interweaves  all  four  into 
a  scheme  of  plot.  [See  above,  page  i68.]  The  word  'story,'  how- 
ever, connotes  the  human  interest;  the  corresponding  term  in  art 
analysis  is  'action.'  An  action  is  a  series  of  incidents  that  can  be 
thought  of  as  a  separate  whole.  In  Othello^  we  may  take  various 
details  from  successive  parts  of  the  play,  and  mentally  put  them 
together  as  '  the  intrigue  of  lago  to  get  money  out  of  Roderigo ' :  this 
is  an  '  action.'  Such  '  actions '  are  the  units  into  which  a  Shakespearean 
plot  resolves  itself  ;  '  stories '  are  actions  which  have  human  interest 
enough  to  stand  alone  (like  the  Story  of  the  Pound  of  Flesh),  whereas 
other  actions  would  have  interest  only  as  analytic  elements  of  a  plot 
scheme. 

A  story,  or  action,  may  be  simple  or  '  complicated.''  Any  sequence 
of  events  which,  for  any  purpose,  is  regarded  as  a  unity,  would  be  a 
simple  action.  In  other  cases  a  train  of  events  is  diverted  from  its 
apparent  course  —  this  is  '  complication '  :  there  follows  then  either 
'  resolution,'  the  complication  being  overcome,  or  tragic  '  determina- 
tion,' the  natural  course  of  events  being  hopelessly  destroyed.  [See 
above,  pages  162-3.] 

Note  :  In  what  follows  the  reader  should  refer  to  the  plot  schetne  of 
each  play  as  it  is  mentioned:  the  references  give  the  pages  below  on 
which  the  schemes  will  be  found. 

The  foundation  step  in  plot  analysis  is  the  identification  of  these 
actions :  the  perception  of  what,  in  regard  to  the  design  of  the  whole, 
is  worth  distinguishing  as  an  independent  unit.  It  is  easy  to  see  that 
an  action  is  constituted  by  an  exhibition  of  jealousy  and  subsequent 
reconciliation,  as  with  Antipholus  of  Ephesus  in  Comedy  of  Errors 
(page  339),  or  the  Fairies  in  Midsummer-Nighfs  Dream  (page  342)  ; 
or  by  a  misunderstanding  and  its  explanation,  as  with  Antipholus  and 
his  slave  Dromio  (page  339)  ;  or  by  the  peril  of  yEgeon  and  his  sudden 
release  in  the  same  play;  or  by  the  haunting  of  the  Mechanics  and 
their  disenchantment  in  Midsummer- Nigh fs  Dream  (page  342)  ;  or 
by  the  artificial  convention  of  the  King  and  his  suite  in  Love'^s  Labour"^ s 


APPENDIX  331 

Lost  and  the  reaction  under  influence  of  his  visitors  (page  348) .  Simi- 
larly, love  that  ends  in  marriage  makes  action  after  action  in  As  You 
Like  It  and  similar  plays  (pages  340,  349,  etc.)  ;  an  action  is  made  by 
the  tragic  love  of  Suffolk  in  //  Henry  the  Sixth,  or  by  the  wooing  in 
broken  French  and  English  in  Henry  the  Fifth  (page  391).  The 
friendship  of  Proteus  and  Valentine,  interrupted  and  restored,  makes 
an  action  (page  341),  and  so  does  the  friendship  of  Achilles  and 
Patroclus  with  its  tragic  termination  (page  362).  Not  only  is  an  ac- 
tion constituted  by  folly  and  its  exposure,  as  with  Parolles  (page  345), 
but  also  by  the  sustained  exhibition  of  folly,  of  which  three  types,  mak- 
ing three  separate  actions,  may  be  seen  in  Twelfth  Night  (page  340) . 
So  the  sustained  pathos  of  Cordelia's  sufferings  in  Z^^r,  or  of  Portia  in 
Julius  CcBsar  (pages  354,  357),  is  sufficient  to  give  individuality  to  an 
action;  similarly,  the  comic  life  portrayed  through  the  two  parts  of 
Henry  the  Fourth  (page  370)  makes  a  comic  action  in  the  plots  of  those 
plays.  We  get  a  character  action,  such  as  that  of  Coriolanus  (page 
358).  Contrast  of  character  makes  a  single  action  when  it  binds  to- 
gether Achilles  and  Ajax  into  a  single  element  of  plot  (page  362)  ;  or 
it  is  a  point  of  contrast  between  two  separate  actions  in  Timon  (page 
355),  where  of  the  two  contrasting  personages  one  is  seen  in  the  move-, 
ment  of  the  play  to  rise  and  fall,  the  other  to  fall  and  rise.  Obviously, 
an  intrigue  makes  a  dramatic  action.     [Compare  pages  343,  344.] 

No  type  of  action  is  simpler  than  the  nemesis  action  made  by  a  crime 
and  its  retribution,  of  which  the  play  of  Richard  the  Third  is  full  (page 
403).    A  whole  group  of  actions  may  be  described  as  arch  actions: 


here  plot  form  and  geometric  form  become  very  close.  An  arch  action 
may  be  a  rise  and  fall,  as  in  the  case  of  the  conspirators  \n  Julius  Ccesar 
(page  357)  ;  the  passage  from  the  end  of  success  to  the  beginning  of 
failure  occurring  at  the  centre  of  the  drama,  as  if  at  the  summit  of  the 
arch.  Or,  the  arch  reversed  appears  in  such  a  plot  as  Winter^s  Tale, 
where  there  is  fall  and  restoration,  the  oracle  appearing  as  keystone 


332  THE  MORAL   SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

(page  350).  A  field  for  ingenuity  is  open  in  the  attempt  to  represent 
plot  design  in  geometric  figure.  This  last  play,  with  its  central  oracle 
gathering  up  the  sixfold  destruction  and  shadowing  the  sixfold  restora- 
tion, would  be  represented  with  considerable  exactness  by  a  figure  like 
this.     [Compare  pages  70,  75,  350.] 


Sometimes  what  gives  unity  to  an  action  is  its  connection  with  the 
movement  of  the  drama.  Thus  in  Two  Gentlemen  (page  341)  the  suc- 
cessive journeys  of  the  different  personages  make  a  complicating  action 
in  the  whole  scheme.  Or,  the  proceedings  of  Horatio  in  Hamlet  (page 
364)  are  a  stationary  action :  they  are  valuable  in  shedding  light  on 
the  rest  of  the  plot,  but  Horatio  himself  is  not  involved  in  the  compli- 
cations which  embrace  the  rest  of  the  personages. 

It  need  cause  no  difficulty  that  an  action  is  sometimes  unified  by 
more  than  one  kind  of  interest,  just  as,  in  geometry,  a  line  may  be  at 
one  and  the  same  time  an  arch  and  a  wave  line.     In  Merry  Wives 


(page  343)  the  Ford  action  is  obviously  an  intrigue ;  but  it  is  also  a 
character  action,  the  intrigue  being  a  revelation  of  a  peculiar  form  of 
jealousy.  The  Coriolanus  action  (page  358)  is  a  triple  action,  of  char- 
acter, nemesis,  and  pathos.     [Compare  page  124.] 


APPENDIX  333 

The  dramatic  effect  of  counteraction  may  be  ground  for  distinguish- 
ing separate  actions ;  thus,  as  soon  as  the  character  of  Coriolanus 
(page  358)  becomes  an  independent  interest,  it  becomes  worth  while 
to  recognise  three  other  interests,  because  these  are  working  in  different 
ways  against  the  realisation  by  Coriolanus  of  his  ideals.  [Compare 
cross  actions,  pages  359,  360,  361.] 

Siibactions.  —  These  are  in  the  fullest  sense  actions,  but  they  also 
stand  in  the  relation  of  subordination,  either  to  other  actions,  or  to  the 
design  of  the  plot  as  a  whole.  In  The  Shrew  (page  344)  it  is  clear 
that  the  suits  of  Hortensio,  of  Gremio,  of  Lucentio,  for  the  hand  of 
Bianca  are  separate  intrigue  actions  in  the  secondary  plot.  But  the 
suit  of  Lucentio  differs  from  the  rest  in  the  fact  that  he  carries  on  a 
twofold  wooing:  a  direct  wooing  in  disguise,  and  an  indirect  wooing 
through  his  servant  Tranio  assuming  the  master's  name.  This  differ- 
ence alone  is  sufficient  reason  for  dividing  the  Lucentio  action  into  two 
subactions ;  there  is  a  further  reason  in  the  fact  that  the  Tranio  sub- 
action  comes  into  conflict  with  what  constitutes  the  primary  plot  of  the 
play.  [See  above,  page  219.]  Another  type  of  subaction  is  seen  in 
Much  Ado  (page  346) .  The  serious  plot  of  that  drama  is  made  by  a 
villanous  intrigue  (of  Don  John)  destroyed  by  the  farcical  irony  of  the 
Watch  (who  blunder  into  an  important  discovery  while  they  are  fussing 
over  trifles).  Now,  the  same  villany  produces  another  intrigue  on  a 
small  scale  —  a  misunderstanding  between  two  friends,  soon  removed 
(see  the  references  on  page  346)  ;  and  in  the  general  trouble  of  the 
main  intrigue  there  is  an  independent  scene  of  petty  irony,  where 
Antonio,  lecturing  his  injured  brother  on  the  duty  of  patience,  loses  his 
temper  and  has  to  be  himself  restrained.  These  two  items  are  in  no 
way  essential  to  the  main  business,  but  have  their  place  in  the  plot  as  a 
petty  intrigue  and  a  petty  irony,  reflecting  the  main  intrigue  and  irony 
in  the  way  in  which,  in  architecture,  the  main  lines  of  the  building  may 
be  reproduced  in  the  details  of  ornament.  Two  more  subactions  of  the 
same  kind  may  be  seen  in  the  same  artistic  plot :  it  is  an  irony  (Leonato 
breaking  off  the  hearing  just  before  the  secret  comes  out)  that  delays 
the  main  resolution,  and  it  is  an  intrigue  (an  honest  intrigue)  of  the 
Friar  that  restores  the  delayed  resolution.  [Compare  a  somewhat  simi- 
lar case  on  page  360.]  — We  have  generating  subactions  in  Lear  (page 
354),  carried  on  to  initiate  the  main  situation,  and  then  merged  in 
other  elements  of  the  plot ;  link  subactions,  and  other  terms,  which  will 
explain  themselves.  —  In  the  succession  of  histories,  where  there  is  a 


334  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

unity  stretching  beyond  single  plays,  it  becomes  necessary  to  indicate 
germ  actions  {e.g.  page  371),  to  cover  matter  which  has  no  relation  to 
the  plot  of  the  particular  play,  but  is  (by  necessity  of  historic  date) 
inserted  in  that  play  to  prepare  for  what  will  be  found  later. 

Circumstances.  —  An  action  is  essentially  a  succession  of  details  taken 
from  different  parts  of  the  play.  But  sometimes  the  place  in  the  design 
of  the  plot  ordinarily  held  by  an  action  is  taken  by  a  single  isolated 
'circumstance.'  Thus  the  shipwreck  in  Comedy  of  Errors  (page  339) 
is  an  isolated  fact  of  the  past ;  yet  it  must  have  a  place  in  the  plot,  as  a 
<  motive  circumstance,'  since  it  is  the  source  of  movement  for  the  whole 
drama,  originating  the  situation  out  of  which  the  separate  actions  arise. 
Similarly,  a  shipwreck  is  a  motive  circumstance  for  Twelfth  Night; 
from  this  comes  Viola,  who  brings  about  the  complication  of  the  play, 
and  Sebastian,  who  resolves  it.  Again,  in  Two  Gentlemen  (page  341) 
the  accident  of  Valentine  being  captured  by  Outlaws  and  becoming 
their  captain  is  the  whole  resolution  of  the  plot ;  it  presents  itself  to 
our  minds  as  a  single  point  in  the  design  upon  which  the  different  lines 
impinge.  In  Romeo  (page  360)  the  accidental  circumstance  of  the  mas- 
querade initiates  the  main  complication,  the  accidental  circumstance  of 
the  infected  house  tragically  determines  the  whole  (above,  pp.  52,  59). 
Other  examples  in  Hamlet  (page  364),  and  Merchant  (page  347),  and 
Timon  (page  355). 

Compounding  of  Actions  into  Plots 

In  Greek  drama  the  whole  plot  of  a  play  would  be  comprehended  in 
a  single  action.  In  Shakespearean  drama  a  number  of  single  actions 
are  interwoven  into  a  plot,  and  such  plots  may  be  further  compounded 
into  a  more  complex  plot,  the  various  elements  of  such  a  scheme  ex- 
hibiting mutual  parallelism  or  contrast,  or  other  effects  of  economic 
harmony.  This  has  been  fully  illustrated  in  the  discussion  of  comedy 
(above,  pages  167-1 76) .  In  the  Comedy  of  Errors  (page  339),  Antiph- 
olus  of  Ephesus  and  Antipholus  of  Syracuse  are  centres  of  separate 
dramatic  interests ;  the  one  passes  through  a  phase  of  family  jealousy 
to  its  termination  in  reconciliation,  the  other  falls  in  love  with  Luciana 
and  eventually  wins  her.  These  two  brothers  Antipholus  have  further  mis- 
understandings with  the  two  Dromios,  which  are  subsequently  explained. 
Here  are  four  distinct  interests  or  actions  going  on  at  the  same  time, 
which,  however,  are  not  separate,  but  clash  together,  owing  to  the  open- 


APPENDIX  335 

ing  situation  of  mistaken  identities.  Obviously,  a  time  will  come  when 
the  pairs  of  twins  will  meet  in  the  same  place,  and  all  the  complications 
will  resolve :  the  four  actions  will  have  been  interwoven  into  a  comic 
plot.  But,  as  a  fact,  how  is  this  brought  about?  Side  by  side  with 
these  actions  another  (serious)  action  has  been  in  view  —  ^geon  in  peril 
of  his  life,  until  a  sudden  release  comes ;  this  release  is  the  meeting 
with  the  personages  of  the  comic  side,  as  a  result  of  which  the  serious 
action  brings  about  the  resolution  of  the  comic  entanglement,  and  the 
meeting  with  the  persons  of  the  comic  entanglement  secures  the  salva- 
tion of  yEgeon.  Thus  the  comic  plot  and  the  single  serious  action  have 
been  interwoven  into  the  main  plot  of  the  play.  —  Or  again,  in  the 
Merry  Wives  (page  343),  we  have  three  separate  intrigues  (FalstafF 
against  the  wives,  the  wives  to  punish  FalstafF,  and  Ford  to  work  out 
his  jealous  scheme)  clashing  together  into  what  may  be  called  the  pri- 
mary plot:  as  a  whole  it  may  be  described  by  the  term  *  corrupt 
wooing.'  Side  by  side  with  this  we  have  another  clash  and  disen- 
tanglement of  three  separate  intrigues  to  win  Anne  Page ;  each  has  its 
separate  interest,  but  they  unite  in  a  second  plot,  which  may  be  de- 
scribed by  the  term  '•  natural  wooing.'  These  two  plots  go  on  side  by 
side,  contrasted  in  spirit,  parallel  in  their  form,  each  consisting  of  three 
clashing  intrigues.  But  the  scheme  of  the  play  involves  still  further 
interweaving,  for  the  primary  and  secondary  plots  clash  together  in  the 
common  climax  of  the  masquerade,  each  producing  a  reaction  upon 
the  other.  [See  above,  pages  174-175.]  — To  take  another  instance: 
the  plot  of  the  Merchant  of  Venice  may  be  roughly  analysed  as  four 
stories  interwoven  (above,  page  168).  More  fully  (see  page  347)  we 
see  in  it  a  primary  plot,  that  may  be  described  as  'character  swayed  by 
accident '  and  a  secondary  plot  exhibiting  '■  accident  swayed  by  char- 
acter.' [See  above,  pages  315-317.]  These  two  plots,  thus  contrasting 
in  matter,  may,  in  form,  be  resolved  into  elements  exactly  parallel  each 
to  each :  a  main  action,  with  two  underactions  reduplicating  the  main, 
one  seriously,  the  other  comically.  There  is  further  interweaving  of 
the  two  plots,  as  the  complicating  and  resolving  forces  of  the  primary 
are  furnished  by  the  leading  personages  of  the  secondary  plot  (page 
168) .  —  The  scheme  of  Lear  (page  354)  is  made  up  of  two  plots  exactly 
parallel :  in  each  a  generating  action  produces  a  situation  of  problem, 
which  finds  a  triple  solution,  the  problem  and  the  three  elements  of  the 
solution  being  the  same  for  each ;  the  two  are  drawn  closer  together  by 
minor  link  actions.     In  the  play  of  Troilus  (page  362)  we  obviously 


336  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM   OF  SHAKESPEARE 

have  two  plots  very  different  in  spirit :  the  one  is  an  heroic,  the  other  a 
love  tragedy.  The  heroic  tragedy  is  a  clash  of  four  tragic  actions, 
drawn  together  into  a  common  ruin ;  the  love  plot  is  a  similar  clash  of 
two  love  actions,  tragically  determined ;  the  heroic  and  the  love  plot 
are  seen  in  their  progress  to  clash  together. 

Underplots. — Where  the  whole  scheme  of  a  play  shows  multiple 
plot,  the  different  plots  may  appear  to  stand  upon  equal  footing,  as  in 
the  primary  and  secondary  plots  of  the  preceding  paragraph ;  or  one 
plot  may  stand  in  subordination,  either  to  another  plot  or  to  the  scheme 
as  a  whole.  One  source  of  such  '  underplot '  is  the  purpose  to  give  plot 
interest  to  the  servants  or  dependants  of  the  leading  personages :  this 
is  the  ^dependent  underplot.'  In  Zmr  (page  354)  one  problem  arises 
in  the  royal  family  itself,  the  other  in  the  family  of  Gloucester,  the 
King's  chamberlain:  this  last  is  thus  a  dependent  underplot.  [For 
other  examples,  see  pages  344,  347.]  In  Shakespeare's  dramatic 
practice  the  spirit  of  an  underplot  may  often  be  found  where  the  term 
does  not  appear  in  the  scheme  of  the  play.  Thus  in  such  plays  as 
Much  Ado,  Midsummer-Nighty  Love'^s  Labour'' s  Lost,  As  You  Like  It, 
there  are  personages  (like  Dogberry  and  Verges,  the  Mechanics,  Armado, 
Audrey)  who  might  well  be  centres  of  underplots,  but  as  a  fact  they 

e  taken  up  into  the  working  of  the  main  plots.  Or  again,  the  place 
of  underplot  is  filled  by  subactions  {Ro?neo,  Macbeth).  —  See  the 
schemes  of  these  plays :   pages  360,  356. 

Enveloping  Action.  —  This  plays  an  important  part  in  the  compound- 
ing of  plots  and  actions  into  a  whole  scheme.  The  term  has  been  fully 
explained  (above,  page  264-8). 

Relief.  Atmosphere.  —  The  discussion  of  comedy  and  tragedy 
(above.  Chapters  VIII  and  IX)  has  emphasised  the  importance  in 
Shakespeare  of  the  mixture  of  tones,  serious  and  lighter.  These  have 
a  place  in  a  scheme  of  plot,  though  they  enter  into  it  only  indirectly. 
The  essential  idea  of  plot  is  that  it  should  reduce  all  the  matter  of  a 
play  to  a  unity  of  design.  But  it  will  often  appear  that,  when  the 
whole  scheme  of  plots  and  actions  is  complete,  there  still  remains  some 
matter  unprovided  for,  and  this  is  found  upon  examination  to  be  part 
of  the  relief  element  of  the  play.  Thus  in  Comedy  of  Errors  (page 
339),  over  and  above  the  drollery  of  the  Dromios  in  conflict  with  their 
masters,  which  is  one  element  of  the  plot  scheme,  there  is  further  fun 
on  their  part,  e.g.  the  scene  (III.  ii,  from  80)  in  which  the  fat  kitchen 
wench  is  described.   This  has  no  place  in  the  plot,  but  must  be  credited 


APPENDIX  337 

to  'relief.'  Similarly  in  Twelfth  Night  (page  340),  apart  from  all  that 
makes  the  plot,  there  is  a  purpose  to  bring  the  Clown  successively  into 
contact  with  all  the  personages  of  the  drama,  with  '  relief  effects.  Thus 
a  plot  scheme  ought  to  indicate  the  treatment  of  relief.  Often  the  relief 
element  is  wholly  immanent  in  the  plot,  or  merged  in  particular  persons 
or  incidents  (pages  347,  349,  360,  etc.).  At  other  times  it  is  outside 
the  plot  scheme,  scattered,  without  attempt  at  design,  through  various 
parts  of  the  play  (pages  339,  345,  etc.).  In  other  cases,  the  relief 
itself  makes  an  underplot :  thus  in  Two  Gentlemen  (page  341)  it  makes 
an  atmosphere  of  itself  contrasting  with  the  atmosphere  of  the  rest  of 
the  play ;  in  Merry  Wives  (page  343)  we  have  for  relief  an  overplus 
of  caricature  personages,  with  subactions  of  complication  and  resolu- 
tion. Yet  again  we  see  cases  in  which  the  relief  element  is  suggestive 
of  design,  though  not  amounting  to  underplot ;  especially  in  Lear  (page 
354),  where  it  is  concentrated  in  the  central  scenes,  or  Wittier^ s  Tale^ 
where  it  distinguishes  in  spirit  the  resolution  of  the  plot  from  its  com- 
plication (page  350,  compare  above,  pages  71-5). 

Conclusion 

The  leading  literary  interest  in  such  plot  analysis  consists  in  realising 
how  drama  can  extend  the  artistic  effects  of  design  —  parallelism,  har- 
mony, contrast  —  into  so  unpromising  a  medium  as  that  of  realistic 
human  life.  At  the  same  time  the  harmonies  and  contrasts  are  full  of 
moral  suggestiveness. 

A  difficulty  is  felt  by  some :  did  Shakespeare  really  intend  all  these 
effects  of  design?  Nothing  of  the  kind  is  suggested.  A  particular 
poet  may  happen  to  be  also  a  man  of  analytic  mind ;  but,  as  poet,  all 
that  he  need  be  credited  with  is  an  exquisite  sense  of  balance  and  har- 
mony. As  the  necessities  of  the  story  lead  him  to  introduce  particular 
details,  the  artistic  instinct  makes  him  feel  these  incomplete  without 
other  details  to  balance  them.  A  sculptor  does  not  go  to  work  with  a 
foot  rule  to  measure  the  limbs  he  is  modelling ;  yet,  when  the  statue  is 
finished,  another  man  may  measure  and  find  interesting  ratios  between 
length  of  arm  and  girth  of  waist.  A  man  of  musical  genius  may  write 
excellent  music,  and  yet  he  may  be  entirely  ignorant  of  the  counter- 
point by  which  others  will  discover  in  his  composition  regular  system. 
In  any  case,  the  question  how  a  poet  came  to  produce  his  work  can 
have  no  effect  on  the  question  of  fact  —  whether  the  finished  work  does 
z 


338  THE  MORAL  SYSTEM  OF  SHAKESPEARE 

or  does  not  exhibit  such  and  such  features.  That  many  readers  feel  a 
difficulty  in  realising  this  is  only  one  among  many  indications  that  lit- 
erary study  is  as  yet  imperfectly  differentiated  from  other  studies,  such 
as  biography ;  many  readers  are  unable  steadily  to  observe  the  poetry 
from  the  fact  of  their  attention  wandering  to  the  personal  poet. 

Finally,  it  must  be  understood  that  a  play  can  be  analysed  into  very 
different  schemes  of  plot.  It  must  not  be  thought  that  one  of  these 
schemes  is  right  and  the  rest  wrong ;  but  the  schemes  will  be  better 
or  worse  in  proportion  as  —  while  of  course  representing  correctly  the 
facts  of  the  play  —  they  bring  out  more  or  less  of  what  ministers  to 
our  sense  of  design. 


339 

THE  COMEDY  OF  ERRORS 
A  Comedy  of  Situation 

Above,  pages  169,  334 

Main  Plot :  From  the  Motive  Circumstance  of  the  Shipwreck 

Comic  Plot  :  the  Situation  of  Error  developing  as  a 

Antipholus  of  Ephesus :    Family  Jealousy  and 
Reconciliation 

Antipholus  and  Dromio  of  Ephesus :  Misunder- 
standing and  Explanation 

Antipholus  of  Syracuse :  Fancy  and  Marriage 

Antipholus  and  Dromio  of  Syracuse  :  Misunder- 
standing and  Explanation 

all  four  drawn  by  the  Error  into  the  maximum  of  Clashing  — 
disentangled  by  contact  with  the  Serious  Action 

Serious  Action  :  Peril  and  Release  of  iEgeon :  impinging  upon 
Comic  Plot,  resolving  it  and  resolved  by  it 

Relief :  Word  fencing  of  Saucy  Servants  —  scattered 


Clash  of  four 
Actions 


340 

TWELFTH   NIGHT 

A  Comedy  of  Situation  Developing 

Above,  pages  170-4 


Plot 


From  the  Motive  Circumstance  of  the  Shipwreck,  by  the  Compli- 
cating Personage  Viola  [disguised  as  a  page]  : 

Main  Plot  :  Situation  of  Error  —  developing  into  a  Clash  or 
Triangular  Duel  of  Fancy 

Viola  in  love  with  Duke 

Duke  in  love  with  Olivia 

Olivia  in  love  with  Viola 

Underplot  :  A  Triplet  of  Folly,  giaded 

Belch  and  Maria :  natural  abandon 
Aguecheek :  imitation  abandon 

Malvolio  :  unnatural  antagonism  to  abandon 
developing  into  a  Clash  of  the  rest  against  Malvolio 

Clash  of  the  Main  and  Underplot  in  the  course  of  develop- 
ment :  Intrigue  to  set  Aguecheek  against  [disguised]  Viola 

From  the  Motive  Circumstance  of  the  Shipwreck,  by  the  Resolv- 
ing Personage  Sebastian  [twin  to  Viola]  : 

Main  Plot  disentangled  as  a  Double  Marriage 
Viola  and  Duke 
Olivia  and  Sebastian 

Underplot  :  Resolved  with  the  resolution  of  the  Main  Plot 
Relief 

Professional  Folly  of  the  Clown  brought  successively  into  contact 
with  all  the  personages  of  the  plot 


341 

THE  TWO   GENTLEMEN  OF  VERONA 

A  Comedy  of  Situation  developing 

Above,  pages  222-8 


Main  Plot:  With  Atmosphere  of  the  Gay  Science  [pages  180-4] 
Original  Situation 


Disconnected 
Triplet 


Friendship  of  Proteus  and  Valentine 
Love  of  Proteus  and  Julia 
Thurio's  suit  to  Silvia  [in  Milan] 


First  phase  of  the  Complicating  Action :  Journey  of  Valentine 


Connected 
Triplet 


Friendship  of  Proteus  and  Valentine 

Love  of  Proteus  and  Julia 

Rivalry  of  Valentine  and  Thurio  for  Silvia 


Second  phase  of  the  Complicating  Action :  Journey  of  Proteus 

against  Love  :  Proteus  false  to  Julia 

against  Friendship  :  Proteus  false  to  Valentine 

in  Social  Life :  Proteus  false  to  Thurio 


Triple 
Intrigue 


Third  phase  of  the  Complicating  Action  :  Journey  of  Julia  in  disguise 

in  Love :  Proteus  wooing  Silvia  in  presence  of 
Julia 

in  Friendship :  Silvia  drawn  unconsciously  to 
Triple  Irony  Julia  by  the  falseness  of  Proteus  to  Valen- 
tine 

in  Social  Life :  Proteus  mocking  Thurio,  with 
Julia's  asides 

Resolving  Accident :  The  Outlaws :  stopping  successive  fugitives 
bring  about  final  clash  and  Final  Situation 


Harmonised 
Triplet 


Friendship  of  Proteus  and  Valentine 
Love  of  Proteus  and  Julia 
Love  of  Valentine  and  Silvia 


Underplot:  Relief  Atmosphere  of  Abandon.    [  Saucy  servants  —  farcical 
word  fencing  —  Dog  sentiment  parodying  sentiment  of  Gay  Science.] 


34^ 

A  MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S  DREAM 
A  Comedy  of  Situation  and  Enchantment 
Above,  pages  229-33 


Plot 


Enveloping  Action  :  Nuptials  of  Theseus  and  Hippolyta 

Enveloping  Motive  Atmosphere  :  Enchantment  of  the  Wood 
on  Midsummer-Night 

Instruments  of    /Complicating:  Cupid's  Flower 

Enchantment  \         ,  .  .     , 

^Resolvmg :  Dian's  Bud 

Main  Plot  :   Clash  in  common  Enchantment,  and  Disentangle- 
ment, of 

I.  Fancy:  the  Lovers.  [A  triple  situation  of 
perversity  —  complicated  into  quadruple 
perversity  —  further  complicated  into  com- 
plete mutual  hostility  —  resolved  into  har- 
mony as  two  pairs  of  lovers.] 


Three  Types 
of  Life 


2.  Fairy  Life :  Oberon  and  Titania.  [Conjugal 
quarrel  —  complicated  into  distraction  of 
monstrosity — resolved  into  reconciliation.] 


3.   Burlesque   (unconscious) :    The   Mechanics. 
[Complicated  into  distraction  of  haunting 
and  resolved.] 
Relief :  immanent  in  plot 


343 

THE    MERRY  WIVES  OF  WINDSOR 
A  Comedy  of  Intrigue 

Above,  pages  174,  228 


Main  Plot 

Primary  :  Corrupt  Wooing  —  a  Clash  of 


Triple 
Intrigues 


Character  Intrigue :  Falstaff  against  the  Wives 

Intrigue  of  Character :  Ford's  Jealousy 
Counter  Intrigue    of    Nemesis:      The    Wives 
against  Falstaff 


a  Clash  of 


Secondary  :  Natural  Wooing  (of  Anne  Page) 

Caricature  :  Slender's  Suit  [backed  by  the  father 
—  from  motives  of  estate] 
Triple  Caricature :  Caius's  Suit  [backed  by  the  mother 

Intrigues  —  from  motives  of  fortune] 

Character :  Fenton's  Suit  [backed  by  the  girl  — 
for  true  love] 


Clash  of  Primary  and  Secondary  plots  in  a  common  climax  of 

Primary  :  final  nemesis  (and  reaction) 
Secondary :    character  vanquishes  caricature 
Mutual  Reaction :  the  laugh  turned  against  the 
persecutors  of  Falstaff.    [Compare  V.  v.  247.] 


The    Mas- 
querade 

Underplot  of  Relief 


Chorus  of  Caricatures 


Simple 

Mistress  Quickly 
Bardolph,  Pistol  and  Nym 
Sir  Hugh  Evans 
Host  of  the  Garter  Inn 


/CompHcation ;   Host's  trick  on  Duellists  [II. 


Resolution:  Duellists'  trick  on  Host  [IV.  iii 
and  v] 


344 

THE  TAMING  OF  THE   SHREW 

A  Comedy  of  Character  and  Intrigue 

Above,  pages  312-22 


Main  Plot 


Primary  :   Paradoxical  Wooing  —  Intrigue  of  Petruchio  to  tame 
the  Shrew  Katherine 


Triple 
Intrigues 


Secondary  :  Natural  Wooing  (of  Bianca)  —  a  Clash  of 

Suit  of  Hortensio    [neighbour]  :    rising  out  of 
the  Primary  plot  and  absorbed  into  it 

Suit  of  Gremio  [old  man]  :  defeated 

Suit  of  Lucentio  [young  stranger]  :  attained  — 
takes  a  double  form 

a       /(a)  Wooes  for  himself  in  disguise  as 
•^  /  Cambio 

^  \ 

c^      \(6)  His  servant  Tranio  wooes  in  his 

master's  name  in  order  to  head  off 

rivals 


Clash  of  Primary  and  Secondary  plots  through  Subaction  (d) 

< Complication  :   Tranio's   false  Vincentio  encountered  by  the 
real  Vincentio  of  the  Primary  plot 
Resolution :  General  comic  Reconciliation 
Dependent  Underplot  of  Relief :  Grumio  as  the  Saucy  Servant 


345 


ALL'S   WELL  THAT  ENDS  WELL 
A  Comedy  of  Character  and  Intrigue 

Above,  pages  236-8 

Plot 

Serious  Plot  :  Love  of  Helena  for  Bertram 

Generating  Subaction:  Helena's  healing  of  the  King  —  which 
develops : 

•Intrigue  of  Bertram  to  evade  marriage  relations 
Cross  Intrigues<(' 

^Intrigue  of  Helena  to  restore  marriage  rela- 
tions 

Comic  Plot  :  Folly  [Heroic  Imposture]  and  Exposure  :  ParoUes  : 
rising  out  of  the  Serious  Plot  and  determined  by  the  Enveloping 
Action 

Enveloping  Action  :  Florentine  War 

Relief :  Humour  of  the  Clown  —  scattered 


346 


MUCH  ADO  ABOUT  NOTHING 

A  Comedy  of  Character  and  Intrigue 

Above,  pages  233-6 

Plot 

Serious  Plot  :  Love  of  Claudio  and  Hero 

Complicating  Villany  Action :  Intrigue  of  Don  John 

w      yPetty    Intrigue:    Misunderstanding  of   Friends: 
,2  /  Claudio  and  Don  Pedro  [I.  iii,  from  42  ;  II.  i, 

%  <  from  161] 

5      ^Petty  Irony:     Rivalry    of   the   angry   Brothers: 
Leonato  and  Antonio  [V.  i] 

Resolving  Farcical  Action :  Irony  of  the  Watch's  discovery 


Q  y(delaying)  Irony  of  Leonato's  Impatience  [HI.  v] 

&  ^(restoring)  Righteous  Intrigue  of  the  Friar 
w 

Supplementary  Comic  Underplot:   Paradoxical  Intrigue  to 
bring  Benedick  and  Beatrice  together 

Enveloping  Action  :  Rebellion  of  Don  John 

Relief :  implicit  in  the  comic  and  farcical  elements  of  the  plot 


347 

THE  MERCHANT  OF  VENICE 

A  Comedy  of  Character  and  Accident 

Above,  pages  31S-7 

Primary  Plot :  Character  swayed  by  Accident 

Main  Nemesis  Action  :  Story  of  the  Pound  of  Flesh :  a  supremely 
noble  Christian  at  the  mercy  of  a  supremely  base  Jew  —  the  posi- 
tions suddenly  reversed 

Complicating  Accident :  The  rumoured  Shipwrecks 
Resolving  Accident :  The  forgotten  Statute 

Dependent  Underactions 

A.  Reduplicating  the  Main  action:  the  Jew's  daughter  for- 

sakes her  father  for  a  Christian 
AA.   Farcical  Subaction:  the  Clown  transferred  from  Jewish 
to  Christian  service 

Enveloping  Action  :  Mediaeval  Feud  of  Jews  and  Christians 

Secondary  Plot :  Accident  swayed  by  Character 

Main  Problem  Action:  The  Caskets  Story — an  apparent  crisis 
of  chance  really  determined  by  character 

Complicating 

and  Resolving  Circumstance :  The  three  Caskets 

Dependent  Underactions 

B.  Reduplicating  the  Main  action :  Gratiano  and  Nerissa 
BB.   Comic  Subaction :  Ironic  Episode  of  the  Betrothal  Rings 

Clash  and  Disentanglement  of  Primary  and  Secondary :  the  Secondary 
Plot  is  the  Motive  force  of  the  Primary 

Complicating  Personage :  Bassanio 
Resolving  Personage :  Portia 

Relief :  merged  in  individual  personages  of  the  plot 


348 

LOVE'S   LABOUR'S   LOST 

A  Comedy  of  Convention  and  Humour 

Above,  page  267 


Plot 

ENVELOPmo  Motive  Action  :  the  French  Embassage 

Complicates :  by  introducing  the  Humorous  Atmosphere 
Resolves :  the  French  king's  death  converts  all  to  serious 

Atmosphere  of  Artificial  Convention 

A.   The  King  and /^"^°°g^*  themselves:  the  Vow 
his  Suite      \^  against  outsiders :  Celibacy 

<in  himself:  Euphuism 
in  relation  to  outsiders :  Hypocrisy 

C.  Nathaniel  and  >*^^"^^^^^^=  Pedantry 

Holofernes  Xfor  outsiders :  Pompous  Pageantry 

Atmosphere  of  Natural  Humour  Complicating  and  Resolving 

AA.   The  Princess  and  /the  Vow 

her  Suite :  break  downXthg  Celibacy 

<Moth :  foil  to  the  Euphuism  of  B  [as  true  wit] 
Jaquenetta :  attracts  B  to  hypocrisy 


CC.   / 


Dull :  foil  to  the  Pedantry  of  C  [as  plain  sense] 
Costard :  breaks  down  the  pompous  pageant  [V.  ii.  678] 


Relief :  immanent  in  the  plot 


349 

AS   YOU   LIKE   IT 
A  Comedy  of  Convention  and  Humour 

Above,  page  179 


Plot 


Outer  Enveloping  Action  :  Civil  War  of  the  Dukes  —  ends  in 

Religious  Conversion 
Inner  Enveloping  Action  :  Feud  in  the  de  Boys  family  —  ends 

in  Dramatic  Conversion 


I.   Love    and    Disguise:     Rosalind    and 
Orlando 


Main  Plot  of 
Quadruple  Loves 


2.  Love  and  Folly:  Audrey  and  Touch- 
stone 

3.  Conventional  Love:  Phebeand  Silvius 

4.  Love  at  first  sight :  Celia  and  Oliver 

Inner  Atmosphere  :  Play  of 

Natural :  Rosalind 
Triple  Humour         Professional :  Touchstone 
Morbid:  Jaques 

Outer  Atmosphere  :  Conventional  Pastoral  Life :  The  Forest  of 
Arden 


Relief :  immanent  in  the  plot 


350 

THE  WINTER'S  TALE 
A  Comedy  of  Fall  and  Restoration 

Above,  pages  65-76,  332 


Plot:  An  Arch  Plot  of  Fall  and  Restoration ~ bound  together  by 
Oracular  Interest 


The  Fall:    Tragic  Tone:    Sundering  of  Sicilia  and   Bohemia 
through  Jealous  Madness  of  Leontes 

lost  wife 

lost  friend 
4;r\^    lost  son 
^■^  N.      lost  babe 

^^y^  \^^   lost  minister  (Camillo) 
^c^N.      lost  servant  (Antigonus) 

<*      N.     ORACLE  I  ^^^^^^^  destruction  revealed 
^      y  I  sixfold  restoration  shadowed 


^  y^  Antigonus's  widow  united  to  Camillo 
^^  y^  minister  restored 
\b.     /^  lost  daughter  found 
<A^  y    son-in-law  in  son  of  old  friend 


friend  restored 
wife  restored  as  from  the  grave 

The  Rise  :  Pastoral  Tone :  Reuniting  of  Sicilia  and  Bohemia  by 
the  Romantic  Love  of  Florizel  and  Perdita 

Underplot  of  Relief :  Atmosphere  of  Rural  Simplicity  (flavoured  with 
Roguery)  accompanying  passage  at  centre  from  Complication  to 
Resolution.     [Above,  pages  71-5.] 


351 

CYMBELINE 
A  Comedy  of  Fall  and  Restoration 


Plot :  An  Arch  Plot  of  Tangled  Wrong  and  Harmonious  Restoration 
—  with  Oracular  Interest  for  emphasis.     [Above,  pages  76-88.] 

The  Wrong  and  Fall 

1 .  Blind  Wrong  [Cymbeline  v.  Belarius  and  Pos- 
thumus]  —  loss  of  all  —  restored  by  victims 

2.  Perverse  Wrong:  Retaliation  [Belarius  v. 
Cymbeline]  —  banished  life  —  rescues  vic- 
tims in  crisis 

Sixfold  scale   3.   Perverse  Wrong :  False  Honour  [Posthumus] 
of  Graded         — lower   crime  —  remorse  —  reunion 
Wrong        4.    Perverse  Wrong:  False  Candour  [lachimo] 
—  lower  crime  —  shame  —  reunion 

5.  Crafty  Villany  [the  Queen] — by  irony  of 
death  an  instrument  of  restoration 

6.  Stupid  Villany  [Cloten]  —  by  irony  of  death 
an  instrument  of  restoration 

by  (i)  loses  husband 
by  (2)  loses  brothers 
by  (3)  loses  her  love 
by  (4)  loses  her  reputation 
by  (5)  her  life  threatened 
by  (6)  her  honour  threatened 
honour  saved 
life  saved 

reputation  cleared 
love  restored 

brothers  found 
husband  recovered 
The  Restoration  and  Rise 

1 .  Suffering  Innocence :  Imogen 

2.  Suffering  Fidelity  :  Pisanio 

3.  Suffering  Guilt :  Posthumus  and  lachimo 

4.  Honest  Intrigue :  Cornelius 

5.  Nature 

6.  Overruling  Providence.     [With  Oracle.] 
Enveloping  Action  :  British  and  Roman  War 

Relief :  Atmosphere  of  Open  Air  Life  in  the  Restoration 


Motive  Centre 
Imogen 


Sixfold 
Forces  of 
Restora- 
tion 


N 


352 

THE  TEMPEST 

A  Comedy  of  Enchantment  and  Restoration 

Above,  pages  322-6 

Plot:  An  Arch  Plot  of  Tangled  Wrong  and  Restoration  —  resting 
upon  the  idea  of  Enchantment  as  omnipotence 

Enveloping  Motive  Action  :  Enchantment  of  Prospero 

Main  Plot:  The  Three  ^ Men  of  Sin'  [III.  iii.  53] 

^v      Usurpation  of  Milan  by  Antonio 
^^xX      Feud  of  Alonso  and  Prospero 

*^^Nv      Conspiracy  of  Antonio  and  Sebastian  [II.  i] 

«»•  \  Motive  Centre  :  Common  Madness 

^^p^y^^   Conspiracy  averted  at  its  crisis 
,Q^y^   Alonso  and  Prospero  become  kinsmen 
^  ^   Throne  of  Milan  abandoned 

Underplot  :  linking  the  two  sides  of  the  Main  Plot 

/Ariel :     upward :     assisting 

1.  Beings     of     Enchantment  (    ^  ,.y°^^^^? 

\  Caliban  :  downward":  resist- 

\     ing  Prospero 

2.  Children:  Enchanted  Love/ ^^^^^^^ 

\  Ferdinand 

3.  Servants:  Intoxicated  Conspiracy /^^^^^^^ 

\Stephano  and  Trinculo 

4.  Spectators  :  Miracle /'^^"'*^^^^'  ^^^  ^^  ^«"^^^° 

\  Sailors,  led  by  Boatswain 

5.  Background  of  Nature/'^^"^P^^* 

\Calm 

Common  Climax  of  Universal  Restoration 
Relief :  merged  in  Nos.  3,  4  of  Underplot  —  and  in  Mask 


I 


353 


Plot 


MEASURE  FOR   MEASURE 

A  Problem  Comedy 

Above,  pages  143-57 

Enveloping  Motive  Action  ;  The  Duke 

•His  withdrawal  generates  the  Problem 

^His  return  assists  the  Solution 

Main  Plot  :  Respectable  Life  [Angelo  etc.]  :  Law  accepted 
'  Problem  Situation 

Law  and  Individual 
Triple  Clash   Purity  and  Passion 
Outer  and  Inner 
Solution :  General  Harmony  of  Mercy 

Nemesis  Action  (assisting  the  generation  of  the  Problem)  : 

Claudio  and  Juliet 
Character  Action  (emphasising  the  Solution)  :  Escalus  — 
Provost 
_        ,.      .      I    a.   Angelo's  Intrigue  against  Isabella 
I      ^Complicatmg|    ^^   intrigue  to  hasten  Claudio's  death 

aa.   Duke's  Intrigue  to  substitute  Mari- 
ana for  Isabella 
esolving        bb.   Accidental  provision  of  a  substitute 
for  Claudio 


^, 


Link  Action  :  Loose  Life :  Lucio 
yComplication :  Raillery 

^Resolution :  Irony  (of  events) 

Underplot  :  Low  Life :  Vice  accepted 
•Complication :  Hardened  Vice 


<., 


Resolution:   Mercy 
[Escalus]  as 


another  chance 

discrimination  of  character  between 
Overdone  and  Pompey 


Relief :  merged  in  Link  Action  and  Underplot 


2A 


354 


KING  LEAR 


A  Problem  Tragedy 


Above,  pages  141-3 


Plot 


Main  Plot 


'  Problem   Situation :    Lear   [Passion]  :    a  father  reversing 
moral  equilibrium  of  the  family 
Solution 

Nemesis  (double)  on  the  father 
Triple  Sequence   Sufferings  of  the  Innocent :  Cordelia 
of  events  Power  used  by  the  evil  for  their  own 

destruction  :  Goneril  and  Regan 

Generating  Subaction :  Cordelia's  Outburst  of  temper 


Dependent  Underplot 

Generating  Subaction :  Edmund's  Plot  against  Edgar 
Problem  Situation :  Gloucester  [Weakness] :  a  father  revers- 
ing moral  equilibrium  of  the  family 
Solution 

Nemesis  (double)  on  the  father 
Triple  Sequence   Sufferings  of  the  Innocent :  Edgar 
of  events  Power  used  by  the  evil  for  his  own 

destruction:  Edmund 


Link  Subactions 


^Albany:  rising 
'ornwall :  sinking 
yOswald :  Servility  and  Nemesis 
^Kent :  Plainness  and  Pathos 
Enveloping  Action  :  War  of  England  and  France 

Relief:  concentrated  in  centre  of  the  movement   [pages  190-1] 

Real :  Lear 
Triple  Madness     Feigned  :  Edgar 

Professional :  the  Fool 

with  an  accompaniment  of  Nature  Passion ;  The  Storm 


355 


TIMON  OF  ATHENS 

A  Tragedy  of  Character 

Turning  upon  the  Outer  and  Inner  Life 


Plot 


Main  Actiok 


Character 


/Timon  (Inner  Life)  :  Rise  and  Fall.     [Volun- 
tary Communism  —  by  Enveloping  Action 
ia.i«v,iti    X  determined  to  tragic  ruin.] 

^Alcibiades  (Outer  Life)  :  Fall  and  Rise.  [In- 
jury from  Enveloping  Action  —  roused  to 
redress.] 


Link  Circumstance:  Dis-/^"^P^^^^^^^  *^^  ^^"  ^^ ^^^^^^ 
covery  of  Gold  \  assists  the  Rise  of  Alcibiades 


<  restrains  the  communism 
a  comforter  in  ruin 


Enveloping  Action  :  Social  Corruption  of  Athens 


Underplot  of  Relief :  Misanthropic  Humour  of  Apemantus  [with  oc- 
casional emphasis  from  the  Fool]  —  in  contact  with  the  enveloping 
corruption  and  tragic  misanthropy 


356 


MACBETH 
A  Tragedy  of  Character  and  Nemesis 

Above,  pages  246-64 
Turning  upon  the  Outer  and  Inner  Life 

Plot 

Main  Action 

Character    /Macbeth  (Outer  Life)  y^  ^^^  ^^^  ^^  ^.^^ 

ContrastXLady  Macbeth  (Inner  Life)/       ^"^  ^^^ 

<Subaction  to  Rise :  Banquo  [Rival  of  Inner  Life] :  Nobility 
and  Pathos 
Subaction  to  Fall :  Macduff  [Rival  of  Outer  Life]  :  Unwis- 
dom (over-caution)  with  Nemesis  and  Restoration 

Enveloping  Action  :  [Illuminating :  see  pages  309-10]  :  Oracu- 
lar Action  [rationalised]  of  the  Witches 

Relief :  Incident ;  the  Porter :  Farcical  Wit 


357 


JULIUS  CyESAR 

A  Tragedy  of  Character  and  Nemesis 

Above,  pages  125-8 

yOuter  Life :  pure  Roman  ideal  of  the  State 
Turning  upon  the  <^ 

Mnner  Life :  claims  of  the  Individual 


Plot 

Main  Nemesis  Action  :  The  Conspiracy :  Rise  and  Fall 


System  of 

Subactions 


^Character  Contrast :  Brutus  and  Cassius 
^Pure  Pathos :  Brutus  and  Portia 

<Subaction  to  Rise :  Fall  of  Caesar 
Subaction  to  Fall :  Rise  of  Antony 


Enveloping  Action  :  Roman  Mob  and  Civil  Faction 
Relief :  Scattered  details  —  in  the  Mob  and  Casca 


358 


CORIOLANUS 

A  Tragedy  of  Character,  Nemesis  and  Pathos 

Above,  pages  113-25 

•Outer  Life :  Principle :  Roman  ideal  of  the  State 
Turning  upon  <(^ 

^Inner  Life :  Compromise :  Claims  of  Individuality 

Main  Plot 

Cross  Actions 

Character  Action:  Coriolanus :  Pure  Ideal  of  the  State. 
[Maintained  against  the  first  counteraction  —  yielding  to 
the  second  in  Nemesis — by  the  third  converted  to  Pathos.] 


First  Counteraction  :  The  People  and  Tribunes  :  Claims  of  In- 
dividuality.    [By  compromise  of  banishment  a  Nemesis.] 

Second  Counteraction:  Volumnia:  Kinship  and  Patriotism 
(i.e.  local  loyalty)  modifying  Ideal  of  the  State.  [By  com- 
promise of  attempted  reconciliation  produces  Nemesis.] 

Third  Counteraction :  Aufidius :  Personal  Rivalry  modifying 
Ideal  of  the  State.     [Converts  Nemesis  to  Pathos.] 

Enveloping  Action  :  Wars  of  Romans  and  Volscians 

Underplot  of  Relief :   Menenius :   Stationary  Character  Action  treated 
for  <  plainness '  (i.e.  Clown  humour) 


359 


ANTONY   AND   CLEOPATRA 

A  Tragedy  of  Character,  Nemesis  and  Pathos 

Above,  pages  128-40 


< Outer  Life :  Public  Life  (of  Antony) 
Inner  Life :  Private  Life  (of  Antony) 


Main  Plot 

yAntony  and  Caesar :  Outer  Life 
Cross  Actions /^ 

^Antony  and  Cleopatra :  Inner  Life 

[Corrupted  individuality  brings  to  Antony  and  Cleopatra 
Nemesis  of  external  ruin  —  out  of  this  ruin  rises  Pathos  of 
individual  nobility.] 

Epic  form  :  Five  stages  of  movement 

1 .  Opening  Situation :  Public  Life  neglected  for  Private 

2.  Return  to  Public  Life :  Rise  of  Antony 

3.  Fall  of  Antony:   Public  Life  infected  with  spirit  of 
Private  Life 

4.  Pathos  of  nobility  in  ruin  of  Antony 

5 .  Pathos  of  imitative  nobility  in  ruin  of  Cleopatra 
Enveloping  Action  :  Roman  Civil  War 


Underplot  of  Relief :  Enobarbus :  Dependent  Action  treated  for  Humour 
—  changing  to  Pathos  with  the  pathos  of  the  Main  Action 


36o 


ROMEO  AND  JULIET 

A  Tragedy  of  Pathos 

Above,  pages  46-64 
Plot 

Cross  Actions 

A.  Feud  of  Montagues  and  Capulets :  tragically  reconciled 

aa.  Subaction :  Feud  of  Duellist  and  Humourist  (Tybalt 
and  Mercutio)  :  tragically  determined  —  assists 
counteraction 

bb.  Subaction :  Suit  of  Paris :  tragically  determined  — 
assists  counteraction 

B.  Love  of  Romeo  and  Juliet :  tragically  consummated 

< initiating :  The  Masquerade 
determining :  The  Infected  House 

•reconciling :    Friar    Laurence:    honest 

, ,  „  /  herb  wonders 

Motive  Personages  <r 

destroying:  The  Apothecary :  dishonest 
herb  wonders 

Enveloping  Action  (rudimentary)  :  Omens  of  impending  Fate 

Relief:   merged  in   minor  personages   [Mercutio,   Nurse,  Peter,  Mu- 
sicians] 


36i 


Plot 


TITUS  ANDRONICUS 
A  Tragedy  of  Horror 

Cross  Actions 

Feud  of  Andronicus  family  and  Saturninus 

First  Counteraction :  Feud  of  Tamora  family  against  Andro- 
nicus 

Second  Counteraction :  Intrigue  of  Tamora  and  Aaron 

Third  Counteraction :  Love  of  Bassianus  and  Lavinia 

Enveloping  Action  :  Roman  and  Gothic  Wars 
Relief :  Incident  of  the  Countryman  treated  for  Rustic  Wit 


363 

TROILUS   AND  CRESSIDA 
A  COMBINED  Heroic  and  Love  Tragedy 


Main  Plot  (Double)  :   An  Heroic  Tragedy  and  a  Tragedy  of  Love 
drawn  together  in  a  common  Enveloping  Action 

Enveloping  Action  :  War  of  Greeks  and  Trojans  [Emphasised 
by  Oracular  Action  of  Cassandra] 

Central  Link  Circumstance  uniting  Heroic  and  Love  plots: 
Calchas's  claim  of  his  daughter  (IIL  iii) 

Heroic  Plot 

1.  Friendship  of  Achilles  and  Patroclus 

2.  Intrigue  of  Achilles  and  Polyxena  (III.  iii, 
Clash  of  from  190) 
Heroic  Actions   3.  Character  Contrast:   Proud  Achilles  and 

proud  Ajax 
4.    Rivalry  of  Achilles  and  Hector 
tragically  determined.     [No.  3  rouses  Achilles  (III.  iii.  225)  to 
the  final  battle  —  No.  2  delays  him  (V.  i.  42),  until  death  of 
Patroclus  (No.  i)  maddens  him  to  treacherous  overthrow  of 
Hector  (No.  4)-] 


Love  Plot 


Clash  of 
Love  Actions 


5.  Passion  of  Troilus  for  Cressida 

6.  Intrigue  of  Cressida  and  Diomedes 


tragically  determined  in  deadly  feud  of  Troilus  and  Diomedes 

Clash  of  Heroic  and  Love  Plots.  [Troilus  in  deadly  feud  per- 
suades Hector  (V.  iii,  from  31)  to  the  final  battle  against  the 
warning  of  the  omens.] 

Underplot  of  Relief 

Thersites,  of  the  Heroic  plot )  ^^^^^^  ^^^  ^^^^^  ^^^^^^ 
Pandarus,  of  the  Love  plot     y 


363 


OTHELLO 
A  Tragedy  of  Situation  developed  by  Intrigue 

Above,  pages  238-41 
Plot: 


Main  Action 

Original  Situation 

Trio 

of  Love  Actions 


1.  Bianca's  liaison  with  Cassio 

2.  Roderigo's  pursuit  of  Desdemona 

3.  True    love    of    Desdemona    and 
Othello 


Motive  Intrigues  centring  in  lago 


Four  Intrigues 


4.  Intrigue  against  Roderigo  to  draw 
money 
15.    Intrigue  to  gain  Cassio's  office 
1^6.    Intrigue  against  Cassio's  life 
7.    Intrigue  against  Othello  to  make 
him  feel  the  pangs  of  Jealousy 


by  lago  as  motive  centre  all  drawn  into  a  unity  —  with 
8.   Reaction :  all  lago's  intrigues  recoiling  on  him  in  Nemesis 
Enveloping  Action  :  The  Turkish  War 
Relief :  Episodes  of  the  Clown 


364 


HAMLET 


A  Tragedy  of  Nemesis,  Character  and  Accident 


Above,  pages  318-22 


Main  Plot 


System  of  Six 
Actions  : 
Graded    Wrong 
with       Nemesis 
and  Pathos 


6. 


The  King :  Greater  Crime  and  (Accident  as- 
sisting) full  Nemesis 

The  Queen :  Lesser  Crime  and  (Accident  as- 
sisting) pathetic  Nemesis 
Polonius :  Politic  Intermeddling  and  (Acci- 
dent assisting)  pathetic  Nemesis 
Guildenstern  and  Rosencrantz:  Lesser  na- 
ture intermeddling  and  (Accident  assisting) 
Nemesis 

Ophelia:  Simple  Love  yielding  to  circum- 
stances and  (Accident  assisting)  pathetic 
Nemesis 

Laertes:  Simple  Duty  yielding  to  circum- 
stances and  (Accident  assisting)  Nemesis 


Motive  Character  Action  :  Hamlet  (resting  on  Outer  and  Inner 
Life) :  by  hesitation  enlarging  the  Wrong  —  by  sudden  determina- 
tion (Accident  assisting)  consummating  the  Nemesis  and  Pathos 

Motive  Circumstances/ ^^^^^^*.^"g  "^^^^"^^^*:  the  Ghost 

\assistmg  consummation :  the  Pirates 

Stationary  Character  Action  :  Horatio :  illuminating  the  plot 

Enveloping  Action  :  Wars  of  Norway  and  Denmark 

Underplot  of  Relief  [Pages  191 -4] 


Successive  phas- 
es of  Passion 
(involved  with 
the   Main) 


Supernatural  Awe :  Ghost  Incidents 
Hysteric  Mockery  of  Hamlet 
Histrionic  Passion  of  the  Players 
Pathetic  Madness  of  Ophelia 
Weird  Humour :  The  Gravediggers 


365 


THE   HISTORIC   SERIES 

Ten  Plays  of  English  History  bound  together  by  a 
Movement  of  Historic  Alternation 

[Above,  Chapter  XIII] 

Prologue  Play :  King  John 

Alternation   between   England   with    King  John  and 
France  backing  claims  of  Arthur  to  the  English  Crown 

Starting  point  for  the  Alternation :  Evenness  of  the  two  sides  empha- 
sised by  Angiers  defying  armies  of  three  potentates  [I-II.  i.  41  s\ 

The  Blanch-Dauphin  alliance  [II.  i,  from  416]  : 
pendulum  swinging  to  the  English  side:  Eng- 
land, France  and  Austria  all  against  Arthur: 
despair  of  Constance  [II.  i.  416-III.  i.  134] 

A  turning-point  in  the  entrance  of  the  Papal  Legate :  Rome, 
France  and  Austria  all  against  England :  triumph  of  Con- 
stance [III.  i,  from  135] 

Fortune  of  War  reverses  all  this :  Austria  anni- 
hilated, France  defeated,  Arthur  taken  prisoner, 
Faulconbridge  mulcting  Roman  property  in 
England:  despair  and  death  of  Constance  [III. 
ii-III.  iv.  hi] 

Reaction :  complete  security  of  the  English  king  encourages 
designs  against  Arthur's  life  —  revulsion  of  people,  desertion 
of  English  nobles  and  invasion  of  England  by  the  French 
prince  [III.  iv.  112-end  of  IVJ 

Upon  submission  of  the  English  crown  to  the 
Pope  Rome  is  transferred  to  the  other  side  — 
Faulconbridge  rouses  resistance  to  invasion, 
French  reinforcements  lost  at  sea,  treason 
against  English  nobles  brings  them  back  to 
their  allegiance  [V.  i-v] 

Accident  of  the  Washes  shows  fortune  turning  against  the 
English  when  King  John  suddenly  dies  of  poison 


366 

Eight  Plays 

Alternation  between  power  of  the  Crown  on  the 
one  and  on  the  other  side  foreign  war  or  sedi- 
tious nobles,  culminating  in  the  Wars  of  the  Roses 


Starting  point  in  play  of  Richard  the  Second:  the  Divine  Right  of 
Kings  in  supreme  emphasis  by  contrast  with  frivolity  of  the  King:  a 
turning-point  in  the  awakening  of  the  Return  from  Ireland  \J-IIl. 
i.  62'] 

Downfall  and  deposition  of  King  Richard  with 
rise  of  the  rebellion  under  Bolingbroke  assisted 
by  Northumberland  [III.  i.  63-IV] 

Bolingbroke  as  King  Henry  the  Fourth,  with  Northumber- 
land as  chief  supporter,  triumphant  over  all  faction  [V] 

With  the  plays  of  Henry  the  Fourth  appears  the 
breach  between  King  Henry  and  Northumber- 
land, who  serves  [above,  page  281]  as  link  be- 
tween factious  uprisings  in  England,  Scotland, 
Wales.  [Highest  point  of  the  rebellion  indi- 
cated in  III.  i.  of  First  Part.] 

Hesitation  of  Northumberland  [above,  page  283]  paralyses 
the  union  of  rebels,  and  they  are  defeated  piecemeal.  [Fail- 
ure of  the  rebellion  indicated  in  II.  iii  of  Second  Part.] 

News  of  the  complete  overthrow  of  the  rebellion 
causes  apoplexy  and  death  of  King  Henry  [IV. 
iv,  from  80] 

Central  stage  of  rest  in  the  Historic  Alternation :  the  kingly  character 
unites  all  factions :  English,  Welsh,  Scotch,  Irish,  all  cooperate  in  the 
War  against  France.     [^Play  of  Henry  the  Fifth.'] 

In  I  Henry  the  Sixth  the  Historic  Alternation  recommences,  and  is 
traced,  first  in  the  war  with  France,  then  in  sedition  by  nobles 


367 


Succession  of  English  losses:  the  Dauphin  at 
Orleans  elate  with  hope  [I.  i-ii.  21] 

Battle:  the  Dauphin  in  full  retreat  [I.  ii.  22-46] 

Sorcery:  Accession  to  the  French  forces  of  the 
Holy  Maid  [I.  ii,  from  47] 

Surprise :  Recovery  to  the  English  side  of  Talbot  redeemed 
from  captivity  [I.  iv.  23-68] 

Gun  Incident :  Salisbury  is  slain  by  the  French 
[I.  iv,  from  69] 

Outburst  of  English  rage  and  Dauphin  put  to  flight  [I.  v. 
init.  stage-direction] 

Sorcery :  Advance  of  the  Holy  Maid :  the  Eng- 
lish routed  and  siege  of  Orleans  raised  [I.  v,  vi] 

Night  Attack :  panic  of  the  French,  and  Orleans  taken  by 
the  English  [H.  i-ii.  33] 

Stratagem  of  Duchess  of  Auvergne  to  capture 
Talbot  [H.  ii.  34-iii.  42] 

Counter  stratagem  of  Talbot :  Duchess  of  Auvergne  over- 
powered [II.  iii,  from  43] 

Stratagem  of  warriors  disguised  as  market  people  : 
Rouen  taken  by  the  French  [III.  ii.  1-74] 

Rouen  retaken  the  same  day  by  the  English,  —  incident  of 
Bedford's  death  [III.  ii,  from  75] 

Diplomacy :  the  English  ally  Burgundy  detached 
by  eloquence  of  the  Holy  Maid  [III.  iii] 

Act  IV  {of  I  Henry  the  Sixth)  is  a  parenthesis  i7i  the  move?nent  of 
alternation :  seditious  spirit  of  English  nobles  [indicated  in  I.  /,  iii ;  II. 
iVf  V ;  III.  i]  now  comes  to  affect  the  French  war.     [Above,  page  288.1 

The  English  capture  the  Holy  Maid,  and  the  power  of 
sorcery  is  overthrown  [V.  ii ;  iii.  1-44 ;  iv] 

The  English  capture  Margaret  of  Anjou,  whose 
infatuating  beauty  brings  about  surrender  of  Eng- 
Ush  conquests  in  France  [V.  iii,  from  45  ;  v] 


368 


With  //  Henry  the  Sixth  the  movement  of  Historic  Alternation  is  trans- 
ferred to  the  factions  of  English  nobles 

The  faction  of  Queen  Margaret,  supported  by 
Suffolk  and  Winchester,  wins  a  series  of  triumphs 
over  the  Protector  Gloucester,  culminating  in  his 
murder  [I-III.  ii.  26] 

General  revulsion  of  feeling :  the  King  alienated  from  his 
Queen,  Winchester  dies  of  remorse,  Suffolk  banished  and 
slain  by  pirates  [III.  ii.  27-IV.  i] 

Sedition  reappears  in  the  popular  rising  of  Jack 
Cade  (secretly  prompted  by  York),  which  is 
successful  over  the  royal  forces  [IV.  ii-viii] 

Gradually  the  rebels  melt  away,  Jack  Cade  is  slain  by  Iden 
of  Kent  [IV.  viii-x] 

Act  V  (of  II  Henry  the  Sixth)  is  a  parenthesis  in  the  movement  of  alter- 
nation :  bringing  to  a  climax  claifns  of  York  that  have  been  rising  through 
two  plays  [see  above,  pages  '2cp-2\  —  by  successful  resistance  at  St. 
Albari's  sedition  grows  into  Wars  of  the  Roses 

With  III  Henry  the  Sixth  the  Historic  Alternation  is  traced  wholly  in 
the  Wars  of  the  Roses :  seen  in  relief  against  a  background  of  the 
un warlike  king  [especially  II.  v  and  III.  i] 

York  in  the  ascendant:  King  Henry  compro- 
mises by  recognising  York  as  his  successor 
[I.  i.  1-210] 

Revulsion  of  feeling  in  favour  of  Lancaster  and  the  Queen : 
Victory  of  Wakefield,  assassination  of  York  and  Rutland 
[I.  i.  211-II.  ii] 

Revulsion  of  feeling  in  favour  of  York :  Victory 
of  Towton,  Clifford  slain  and  King  Henry  taken 
prisoner  [II.  iii  to  III.  i] 

Edward  of  York  as  King  makes  a  mesalliance :  Warwick, 
Clarence,  and  French  alliance  secured  for  Lancaster  —  in- 
vasion. King  Edward  taken  prisoner  [III.  ii-IV.  iv] 


369 


Escape  of  King  Edward  by  stratagem  [IV.  v] 

King  Henry  in  power,  supported  by  Clarence  [IV.  vi] 

Advance  of  Edward :  King  Henry  captured  and 
Clarence  returns  to  Yorkists  —  battles  of  Barnet 
and  Tewkesbury  —  capture  of  Queen,  assassina- 
tion of  Prince  and  King  [IV.  vi.  77-VJ 

With  the  play  of  Richard  the  Third  the  Historic  Alternation  is  seen 
in  the  House  of  York  divided  against  itself:  double  alternation  in  the 
whole  and  the  parts.     [Above,  pages  42-4.] 


Main  Plot:   the  Rise  and 

The  Rise  of  Richard  is  the  motive 
force  of  an  alternating  system  of 
Nemesis  actions,  the  victor  of  one 
being  the  victim  of  the  next 


the  Fall  of  Richard 

The  form  taken  by  the  Fall  of 
Richard  is  an  alternation  of  sug- 
gestions of  hope  and  despair  car- 
ried on  into  the  battle  itself 


Epilogue  Play:  Henry  the  Eighth 

Alternation    in    Public    life  :     the    Mask 
Alternation  in  Individual  life :  the  History 


The  Mask 

Rise  of  Ann  Bullen  :  Her  meeting 
with  the  King 

Fall  of  Katherine:  the  Di- 
vorce Court  pageant 

Rise  of  Ann  Bullen :  Her  corona- 
tion as  Queen 

Fall  of  Katherine  seen  in 
Vision  as  Exaltation  of  a 
Saint 

Rise  of  Ann  Bullen :  Christening 
of  her  babe  Elizabeth 


The  History 

Buckingham  seen  in  haughty  ex- 
altation 

Buckingham  exhibited  in  his 
humihation 

Katherine  in  a  position  of  dig- 
nity and  power 

Katherine  in  obscurity 

WoLSEY  in  supreme  exaltation  and 
security 

Wolsey  fallen 

Cranmer  in  disgrace 

Cranmer  in  exaltation 


370 

THE   HISTORIC  PLAYS   SEPARATELY 

King  John 
Main  Plot 

Prologue  to  the  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Series 

Underplot 

1.  A  System  of 

Character        Arthur :  Child  life  as  a  link  between 
Subactions     (  Constance :  Passionate  Motherhood 
I  Hubert :  the  Man  of  Mystery 

2.  Character  Development :  Faulconbridge 

Relief  :  implicit  in  character  of  Faulconbridge 


Richard  the  Second 
Main  Plot 

Part  of  the  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Series 

Underplot 

•York  and  Loyalty 
Character  Contrast  <^ 

^Aumerle  and  Sedition 
Relief:  spectacular 

First  and  Second  Parts  of  Henry  the  Fourth 
Main  Plot 

Part  of  the  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Series 

Underplot  of  Relief 

Comic  Action  of  Prince  Henry  and  the  FalstafF  lads 


371 

Henry  the  Fifth 
Main  Plot 

Stage  of  Rest  in  the  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Series : 

An  ideal  Character 


revealed  in  five  epic  stages 


The  Council 

Heroism  v.  Treason 

Action 

Trouble 

Love 

Underplot 

1 .  Survival  of  the  Comic  Action  of  the  Falstaff  crew 

2.  Reconciled  factions  [English,  Welsh,  Scotch,  Irish]  displayed 
in  military  cooperation 

3.  Love  making  in  broken  French  and  English 
Relief  :  implicit  in  Underplot 


First  Part  of  Henry  the  Sixth 
Main  Plot 

Part  of  the  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Series 

Underplot  of  Germ  Actions  only 
Germ  of  Sedition  [L  i,  iii;  IIL  i] 

Germ  of  Wars  of  Roses  [IL  iv,  v;    IV.  iv;    in  IV.  merged  in 
French  War] 

Germ  of  Love  of  Margaret  and  Suffolk  [V.  iii,  from  45] 
Relief  :  spectacular  —  merged  in  the  main  plot 


372 

Second  Part  of  Henry  the  Sixth 
Main  Plot 

Part  of  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Series 

Underplot 

Germ  Action  of  Wars  of  Roses  [I.  i,  from  207;  II.  ii;  III.  i.  87 
and  from  282 ;  V] 


Relief  Incidents 


Duchess  of  Gloucester  and  Sorcery  [I.  ii,iv;  II. 

i,  from  165  ;  II.  iii,  iv] 
York  and  Popular  Judicial  Combat  [I.  iii.  init. 

and  from  180;  II.  iii,  46] 
Gloucester  and  Popular  Miracle  [II.  i] 


Love  of  Queen  and  Suffolk  [III.  ii,  from  289;  IV.  iv]  ■ 

Enveloping  Oracular  Action  [I.  iv:  all  fulfilled]  ^ 


Third  Part  of  Henry  the  Sixth 
Main  Plot 

Part  of  alternating  movement  of  the  Historic  Succession 

Underplot 

Germ  Action  of  Character  and  Ideal  Villany 

Relief  :  spectacular — merged  in  the  main  plot 


Richard  the  Third 


Main  Plot  and  Underplot  :  part  of  the  alternating  movement  of  the 
Historic  Succession.     [Above,  page  293] 

Relief  :  implicit  in  character  of  Richard 


373 

Henry  the  Eighth 

Mask  Plot  and  Historic  Plot  :  part  of  the  alternating  movement 
of  the  Historic  Succession 

Relief  ;  spectacular  in  the  Mask 


INDEX   OF   PLAYS 


All's  Well  That  Ends  Well:  plot 
scheme  345  —  comments  169,  178, 
236-8,  265. 

Antony  and  Cleopatra  :  plot  scheme  359 

—  comments  113,  128-40, 188,  190. 

As  You  Like  It:  plot  scheme  349  —  com- 
ments 179,  243,  336. 

Comedy  of  Errors  :  plot  scheme  339  — 
comments    169,    178,    311,   330,  334, 

334-S.  336. 

Coriolanus :  plot  scheme  358  —  com- 
ments 113-25,  189,  332,  333. 

Cymbeline  :  plot  scheme  351  —  com- 
ments 76-88,  179,  243,  265,  267,  298, 

319- 

Hamlet :  plot  scheme  364  —  comments 
191-4,  242,  265,  267,  298,  299-302, 
305-6,  308-10,  312-3,  318-22,  332,  334. 

Henry  the  Fourth :  plot  scheme  370  and 
366  —  comments  279,  281-4,  331- 
First   Part :    comments    15-22,    206, 
243.  Second  Part :  comments  16, 

18,  19,  23,  200,  201,  243. 

Henry  the  Fifth:  plot  scheme  371  and 
366  —  comments  13-32,  242,  243,  284, 

331. 
Henry  the  Sixth :   comments   270,  279, 
284-s, 
First  Part :  plot  scheme  371  and  366-7 

—  comments  285-9,  298,306. 
Second  Part:    plot  scheme  372  and 

368  — comments  33,  289-92,  331. 
Third   Part:    plot   scheme  372  and 
368-9  —  comment  33-9,  292-3. 

Henry  the  Eighth  :  plot  scheme  373  and 

369  —  comments  89-105,  188,  189,  294, 
298,  306. 

John  {King)  :  plot  scheme  370  and  365 

—  comments  189,  243,  270-9,  279. 
Julius  Ccesar :  plot  scheme  357  —  com- 
ments 113,  125-8,  189,  304-5,  331. 

Lear  (King):  plot  scheme  354 — com- 
ments 46-7, 141-3,  158,  188,  190-1,  243, 
265.  267,  331.  333,  335,  336.  337. 

Love's  Labour's  Lost :    plot  scheme  348 

—  comments  179,  267-8,  330,  336. 


Macbeth:  plot  scheme  356  —  comments 
189,  246-64,  298-9,  302,  303-4,  305, 
306-8,  336. 

Measure  for  Measure :  plot  scheme  353 

—  comments  143-57,  158,  178,  211-2. 
Merchant  of  Venice :  plot  scheme  347  — 

comments    168-9,   178-9,    210,   245-6, 

265,  313-7.  330.  334.  335- 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor :  plot  scheme 

343  —  comments    174-5,    "^n-^t    201, 

228,  332,  335,  337. 
Midsummer-Night' s  Dream :  plot  scheme 

342  —  comments  178,229-33,266,297, 

330.  336. 
Much  Ado  about  Nothing :  plot  scheme 

346  —  comments  178, 233-6,  243,  265-6, 

311.  333.  336. 
Othello  :  plot  scheme  363  —  comments 

188, 189,  238-41,  265,  330. 
Richard  the  Second:  plot  scheme  370 

and  366  —  comments  15,  17,  18,  188, 

188-9,  280-1. 
Richard  the    Third:    plot  scheme  372 

and  369  —  comments  39-45,  188,  190, 

265,  267,  293-4,  303- 
Romeo  and  Juliet:  plot  scheme  360  — 

comments  46-64,   188,  190,   265,  323, 

334.  336. 
Taming  of  the  Shrew :  plot  scheme  344  — 

comments  177,  212-21,  333. 
Tempest:  plot  scheme  352  —  comments 

179.  297,  322-6. 
Timon  of  Athens  :    plot  scheme  355  — 

comments  189,  331,  334. 
Titus  Andronicus  :    plot  scheme  361  — 

comment  189. 
Troilus  and  Cressida  :  plot  scheme  362 

—  comments  331,  335. 

Twelfth  Night:  plot  scheme  340 —  com- 
ments 170-4,  178,  228-9,  331.  334.  337- 

Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona  :  plot  scheme 
341  —  comments  180-4,  222-8, 311, 331, 
332,  334.  337. 

Winter's  Tale :  plot  scheme  350  —  com- 
ments 65-76,  179,  298,  306,  331-2, 
337. 


375 


GENERAL   INDEX 


Abandon  as  a  dramatic  tone  176,  341. 

Accident,  moral  and  physical  discrimi- 
nated: 50  and  Chapter  III,  311  and 
Chapter  XV  —  negative  aspect,  in  re- 
lation to  connection  of  character  and 
feite:  50,  317  —  positive  aspect,  asso- 
ciated with  providence:  317-26,  87  — 
illustrations :  Romeo  and  yuliet  50  and 
Chapter  III,  360;  Merchant  313-7; 
Hamlet    319-21;     various    31 1-2. 

Comedies  of  Accident  347  —  Trag- 
edies of  Accident  364. 

Action,  as  the  unit  of  plot:  330-4 — 
simple  and  complicated  330  —  varieties 
of  330-3  —  subactions  333  —  circum- 
stances substituted  for  actions  334  — 
compounding   of   actions    into  plots 

334-7. 

Alternation  an  element  in  Shake- 
spearean conception  of  history  270, 
295-6  —  traced  in  succession  of  plays 
270-96,  365-9. 

Ancient  v.  modem  thought  as  to  com- 
munity and  individual  111-3. 

Antimask  89. 

Arch  as  a  type  of  dramatic  form  76,  331, 
350-2. 

Aristophanes  160. 

Aristotle  9,  161,  329. 

Atmosphere,  as  an  extension  of  dra- 
matic tone:  179-84  [compare  336-7] 
—  illustrations:  Winter's  Tale  71-3, 
179,  350 ;  Two  Gentlemen  180-4,  34^  I 
various  55, 179-80,  342,  348-51. 

Balance,  Moral,  or  Heroism :  11, 13  and 
Chapter  I  —  balance  of  tones  177-8. 

Ballad  dance  159. 

Being  and  Doing,  antithesis  of:  91. 

Ben  Jonson  89,  196. 

Biblical  religion,  alleged  effect  on  dra- 
matic conceptions :  47. 


Captives,  Play  of:  163-4. 

Caricature  as  a  dramatic  tone  160,  163, 
176,  177-8,  343. 

Centre,  dramatic  [central  personages, 
etc.] :  76,  84,  351,  352,  362,  363,  366. 

Character,  relation  to  fate:  7,  46-51  — 
character  action  331,  370 — comedies 
of  344-7  —  contrast  355-7,  370  —  de- 
velopment 14-23,  33-9,  370 — ideal 
character  371   [compare   Chapter   I] 

—  tragedies  of  355-9,  364. 
Chorus  159, 161. 
Chronicle  histories,  185. 
Circumstance  as  an  element  of  plot  334, 

339-41,  364. 

Circumstances,  sway  of,  as  one  of  the 
forces  of  life :  264-8  [compare  62-4]  — 
its  dramatic  expression  in  the  Envelop- 
ing Action  264-8. 

Clash  and  disentanglement  170-6,  339- 
40,  342-3,  347,  362. 

Classification  of  Shakespearean  plays 
185. 

Climax,  dramatic :  76,  343,  352. 

Clouds,  Play  of:  161. 

Clown  189-94,  340,  345.  349,  363. 

Comedy :  as  life  in  equilibrium  109,  158 
and  Chapter  VIII  —  primitive  159-60 

—  Old  Attic  160-2, 176  —  Roman  162-4 

—  Classical  164 — of  Situation  164  — 
changes  of,  in  Dark  Ages  164-6. 
Shakespearean    conception    founded 
on  union  of  drama  and  romance  166-7 

—  story  raised  to  its  highest  power 
167^6  —  harmony  of  tones  177-84  — 
as  life  in  equilibrium  184— the  con- 
verse of  Shakespearean  tragedy  194. 

Comedies  of  Accident  347  —  of  Char- 
acter   344-7  —  of   Convention   348-9 

—  of  Enchantment  342,  352  —  of  Fall 
and  Restoration  350-1  — of  Intrigue, 
343-6. 


376 


GENERAL  INDEX 


377 


Commnnity  and  individual,  antithesis 
of:  HI  and  Chapter  VI  —  ancient  and 
modern  conceptions  distinguished  iii- 
3  —  a  view  point  for  the  Roman  plays 
113  —  in  Coriolanus  appears  as  princi- 
ple and  compromise  113-25  —  in 
yullus  Ccssar  evenly  balanced  125-8 

—  in  Antony  and  Cleopatra  appears 
as  public  and  private  life  of  Antony 
128-40. 

Complexity,  moral,  in  the  Shakespearean 

world :  109  and  Book  II. 
Complexity  and  Harmony,  in  Measure 

for  Measure  :  143-57. 
Complicating  action  332. 
Complication  and  resolution ;  162-3,  33° 

—  an  element  of  Shakespearean  com- 
edy 169-76  —  illustrations:  Twelfth 
Night  170-4;  Merry  Wives  174-5; 
various  169-70. 

Compliment  as  an  element  of  the  mask 

89,  92,  105. 
Compromise  v.  principle  in  Coriolanus 

114-25. 
Comus  159. 
Contrast  as  an  element  of  plot  interest 

334- 
Convention,  comedies  of,  348-9. 
Counteraction,  333,  358,  361. 
Court  Fool  142 :  see  Clown. 
Cross  Actions,  345,  358-61. 

Dark  Ages,  164-5. 
Deformity  of  Richard  33-4. 
Dependent  Underplot  336,  344,  347,  359. 
Destiny  in  Greek  drama  47  —  in  Shake- 
speare 62-4,  302,  309. 
Doing  and  Being,  antithesis  of:  91. 

Enchantment,  comedies  of,  342,  352. 

Enveloping  action :  dramatic  expression 
of  environment  as  one  of  the  forces  of 
life  264-5  —  as  an  element  of  plot  264- 
S  —  its  connection  with  the  history 
drama  268-9  —  illustrations :  Much 
Ado  265;  Midsummer-Night  266; 
Love's  Labour's  Lost  267;  various  41, 
265-8,  342,  345-9,  351-64. 

Environment  in  application  to  Shake- 
speare's Moral  System :  242,  264-8  — 


circumstances  as  immediate  environ- 
ment 264-8  —  historical  environment 
269  and  Chapter  XIII — supernatural 
environment  297  and  Chapter  XIV  — 
overruling  providence  311  and  Chap- 
ter XV. 

Epic  form  359,  371. 

Equilibrium:  Life  in,  as  comedy  109 — 
overthrown,  as  tragedy  109  —  unstable, 
as  a  moral  problem  in  Lear  141-3. 

Error  as  a  dramatic  term  169, 339, 340. 

Ethics,  relation  of  Shakespeare  to :  5  — 
institutional  144. 

Experiment  in  morals  {Measure  for 
Measure)  :  148-56. 

Experimental  side  of  philosophy,  as  fic- 
tion :  4,  141. 

Fall  and  Restoration,  Comedies  of: 
3SO-I. 

Fall  and  Rise :  as  a  form  of  movement 
355  — in  the  life  without  and  the  life 
within :  91-2  —  illustrations  :  Henry 
the  Eighth  91-107;  Antony  and  Cleo- 
patra 132-5. 

Fallacy  of  Quotations  i,  7,  8. 

Falstaff  174-5,  19s.  199.  200,  203-6. 

Fancy  as  a  dramatic  tone  176. 

Farce  as  a  dramatic  tone  346. 

Fatalism  distinguished  from  historic 
alternation  296. 

Fate  in  relation  to  character  7. 

Feud  of  Jew  and  Christian  313-5,  347 
—  of  Montagues  and  Capulets  360 
[compare  Chapter  III  passim"]. 

Fiction  as  the  experimental  side  of  phi- 
losophy 3-6. 

Fool  142, 189-94, 205,354-5.  [See  Clown.] 

Forces  of  life  in  Shakespeare's  moral 
system  8,  9,  207  and  Book  III  — of 
restoration  in  Winter's  Tale  and  Cym- 
beline  84. 

Foreshadowing,  dramatic :  62-4. 

Fun  as  a  dramatic  tone  176. 

Gay  Science  180,  341. 
Generating  Action  333,  345,  354. 
Germ  Action  334,  371-2. 
Ghost  scenes  as  dramatic  relief  193. 


378 


GENERAL  INDEX 


Ghosts,  Shakespeare's  treatment  of: 
298-310. 

Graded  folly  171,  340  — tone  196-8  — 
wrong  Tj  [compare  351],  319-21  [com- 
pare 364]. 

Heredity  in  application  to  Shakespeare's 

moral  system  242-64. 
Heroic  tragedy  362. 
Heroism  as  a  root  idea  in  Shakespeare's 

moral  system  11  and  Chapter  I. 
Historic  movement  as  one  of  the  forces 

in  Shakespeare's  moral   system  270, 

294-6  —  historic  succession    of   plays 

269-96,  365-73. 
History  as  a  class  of  drama  185,  268  and 

Chapter  XIII  —  pendulum  of  269  and 

Chapter  XIII. 
Histrionic  passion  as  relief   in  drama 

193.  364- 
Horror,  tragedy  of :  361. 
Humour,  moral  significance  of:  195  and 

Chapter  X  —  the  word  '  humour '  195-6 

—  as  a  technical  term  of  drama  196-8 
its  various  applications  in  life  and  in 
drama  199-206  —  an  element  in  char- 
acter 199 — as  comic  conscience  199 

—  as  suspension  of  moral  law  199-201 
— in  relation  to  ways  of  human  nature 
201  —  application  to  vice  201-3  —  es- 
sential to  a  censor  of  morals  202  — 
humour  and  wit  204-6  [compare  196] 

—  relation  to  the  Jester  205. 
Hysteria  in  relation  to  the  Jester  and  to 

madness  190-4  —  as  relief  in  tragedy 
193.  364  —  as  tone-clash  197-8  —  puns 
as  verbal  hysterics  198. 

Individual  and  community,  antithesis 
of:  III  and  Chapter  VI  —  ancient  and 
modern  conceptions  distinguished 
111-3  —  a  view  point  for  the  Roman 
plays  113  —  in  Coriolanus  appears  as 
compromise  and  principle  113-25  —  in 
yulius  CcBsar  evenly  balanced  125-8  — 
in  Antony  and  Cleopatra  appears  as 
private  and  public  life  of  Antony 
128-40. 

Individual  and  law,  antithesis  of,  in 
Measure  for  Measure  :  143-57. 


Inner  and  Outer:  in  and  Chapter  VI. 
[See  Life  Without.] 

Innocence  and  pathos  as  a  root  idea  in 
Shakespeare's  moral  system  11,  46-51 
—  illustration:  Romeo  and  Juliet 
51-64. 

Institutional  Ethics  144. 

Interlude  185-6. 

Interweaving  of  plots  168,  335  [com- 
pare 334-8]. 

Intrigue  as  a  dramatic  expression  of 
personal  will ;  209  and  Chapter  XI  — 
relation  between  intrigue  and  irony 
210-2 — illustrations :  Tatning  of  Shrew 
212-21;  Two  Gentlemen  221-^;  various 
210,  211,  228-41,  340-1,  343-6,  363, 
[compare   85]. 

Comedies  of  Intrigue  343-6  —  Trag- 
edies of  Intrigue  363. 

Irony  associated  with  Intrigue  as  a 
dramatic  expression  of  personal  will 
21 1-2  [see  above  Intrigue]  —  other 
illustrations :  42,  74,  82-3,  346  —  irony 
of  fate  and  of  circumstances  distin- 
guished 241  [compare  62-4]. 

Jealousy,  types  of,  distinguished :  66. 

Jester  189-94.   [See  Clown.] 

Job,  Book  of,  its  bearing  on  connection 

of  Character  and  Fate :  48-9. 
Justice  and   Policy,  in  Julius  Ccesar  : 

127-8. 

Laboratory,  moral,  the  theatre  as :  141. 

Law  and  individual,  antithesis  of,  in 
Measure  for  Measure  :  143-57. 

Liberty,  ancient  and  modem  conceptions 
of:  112  [compare  128]. 

Life,  types  of,  in  Measure  for  Measure: 
143-57- 

Life  Without  and  Life  Within,  The :  11, 
89  and  Chapter  V  —  one  of  the  root 
ideas  in  Shakespeare's  moral  system 
90-2,  106-7  —  as  Doing  and  Being  91 
—  as  law  and  individual  143  —  in  rela- 
tion to  differences  between  ancient 
and  modern  thought  111-3  —  illustra- 
tions :  Henry  the  Eighth  go-iorj,  294 ; 
Coriolanus  113-25,358;  Julius  Ccesar 
125-8,  357  ;  Antony  and  Cleopatra  128- 
40,  359 ;  various  143,  321-2, 355-9, 364. 


GENERAL  INDEX 


379 


Link  actions,  personages,  etc. :  333,  353- 

5.  362. 
Love,  Tragedies  of:  362. 
Ludicrous  as  a  dramatic  tone  176. 
Lynch  mercy  (in  Escalus)  148. 

Madness  in  relation  to  the  Fool  190  —  to 
Hamlet  191-4  —  trio  of  madness  in 
Lear  191. 

Mask  87-8,  89  and  Chapter  V,  352,  369, 

373- 

Mediaeval  drama,  its  influence  on  Ro- 
mantic drama  185-6. 

Mercy  as  the  solution  in  Measure  for 
Measure  156-7. 

Minstrels  165. 

Miracle  Play  185-6. 

Mirror  for  Magistrates,  The :  166, 187. 

Modem  v.  ancient  thought  as  to  com- 
munity and  individual  111-3. 

Momentum  of  character,  as  one  of  the 
forces  of  life  in  Shakespeare's  moral 
system :  242-64  —  illustrations  :  Mer- 
chant of  Venice  z^s-S  —  Macbeth  246- 
64. 

Moral  Problems  dramatised  109, 141  and 
Chapter  VII  —  Lear  141-3  —  Measure 
for  Measure  \\'^-'C;]  —  Merchant  of 
Venice  347. 

Moral  System  of  Shakespeare,  what  is 
implied  in :  1-9. 

Morality  play  185-6. 

Mystery  play  185-6. 

Nature  as  a  force  of  restoration  85-6. 

Nemesis  :  not  an  invariable  principle  of 
providence  46  —  in  character  (hu- 
mour) 199  —  nemesis  action  331  — 
illustrations  :  Richard  the  Third  42-5, 
369;  Coriolanus  124-5,  358;  Antony 
and  Cleopatra  136-43,  359 ;  Lear  141- 
2,  354;  various  343,  347,  353,  355-7, 
363-4. 

Night  Scene  in  Richard  the  Third  43-4. 

Omen :  philosophy  of,  317-8  —  in  Shake- 
speare 298,  303-5  [compare  62-4]. 

Oracle  and  Oracular  action :  65,  69-71, 
76,  87-S,  332,  350-r,  356,  362,  372. 


Outer  and  Inner:  iii  and  Chapter  VI. 
[See  Life  Without.] 

Overruling  providence:  318-26  —  illus- 
trations :  Cymbeline  87-8 ;  Hamlet  318- 
22 ;   Tempest  322-6. 

Pageant  89. 

Paradox :  as  a  dramatic  interest  akin  to 
irony  212  —  illustrations:  Taming  of 
Shrew  212-6,  222,  344;  Much  Ado 
235-6,  346. 

Parallelism  as  an  element  of  plot  beauty 
334-8  passim. 

Parasite  163,  164. 

Passion  and  purity,  antithesis  of,  in 
Measure  for  Measure  :  143-57. 

Pastoral  as  a  dramatic  tone  71-3, 349, 350. 

Pathology,  moral,  dramatised  in  humour 
202, 

Pathos  II,  46-51,  51-64,  124-5,  13^401 
319-22,  357,  364. 

Patrician  party  in  Coriolanus  114-23. 

Patriotism,  ancient  and  modem  con- 
ceptions of:  121,  123-4. 

Pendulum:  of  history  269  and  Chapter 
XIII  —  of  retribution  41. 

Personality  as  one  of  the  forces  of  life 
in  Shakespeare's  moral  system  209 
and  Chapter  XI  — expressed  in  In- 
trigue and  Irony  209-12. 

Plautus  163,  169. 

Plebeian  party  in  Coriolanus  114-23. 

Plot  in  Shakespeare :  329  and  Appendix 

—  general  conception  of  plot  329, 337-8 
[compare  3,  41,  50-1,  61,  65,  70,  73,  76, 
83,  106,  122,  153,  156,  237,  264,  302]  — 
difference  of  Greek  and  Shakespearean 
or  Classical  and  Romantic  329  [com- 
pare 168]  — unit  of  plot  or  action  330-4 

—  compounding  of  actions  into  plots 
334-7  —  representation  of  plot  in  geo- 
metrical design  331-2  — plot  schemes 
for  Shakespearean  plays  339-73. 

Plutarch,  185. 

Poetry:   relation  of,  to  prose  3-6 — to 

verse  3-6  —  to  philosophy  3-6. 
Policy  and  Justice,  in  Julius   Ccesar  : 

127-8. 
Principle  v.  compromise  in  Coriolanus 

114-25. 


380 


GENERAL  INDEX 


Problems,  Moral,  dramatised :  109, 141 
and  Chapter  VII — Lear  141-3 — Meas- 
ure for  Measure  143-57  —  Merchant  of 
Venice  347. 

Prose,  relation  of,  to  poetry  and  verse : 

3-6. 

Providence  in  relation  to  plot :  3,  7,  41, 
43-S,  47-51  [compare  Chapter  III 
passim],  65,  106,  241,  295,  297  —  over- 
ruling providence  as  one  of  the  forces 
in  Shakespeare's  moral  system  318-26 
— illustrations :  Cymbeline  87-8,  351 ; 
Hamlei  "^1^-2.2;    Tempest  ■^22-6. 

Psychology,  relation  of  Shakespeare 
to:  5. 

Puns  as  verbal  hysterics  198. 

Purity  and  passion,  antithesis  of,  in 
Measure  for  Measure:  143-57. 

Quotations,  Fallacy  of:  i,  7,  8. 

Redemption  as  a  poetic  ideal  65,  76. 

Relief  in  tragedy  188-94  —  in  relation  to 
plot  336-7  —  illustrations:  Lear  190- 
1 ;  Hamlet  191-4 ;  various  188-90  [com- 
pare 354-64]  —  relief  in  comedy  336-7 
[compare  339-53]- 

Renaissance  166-7. 

Resolution  (of  complication)  :  162-3. 

Restoration :  wrong  and,  as  one  of  the 
root  ideas  of  Shakspeare's  moral  sys- 
tem :  11,65-88  —  spirit  of,  in  Winter's 
Tale  71-6  —  forces  of,  in  Winter's  Tale 
and  Cymbeline  84-8  —  universal  352. 

Retribution:  a  ftindamental  idea  in 
morals  40  —  its  relation  to  plot  40-5  — 
not  an  invariable  principle  of  provi- 
dence 46  and  Chapter  III  passim  — 
wrong  and  retribution  as  one  of  the 
root  ideas  in  Shakespeare's  moral  sys- 
tem II,  33  and  Chapter  II. 

Rise  and  Fall,  as  a  form  of  movement : 
355.  356,  369  —  in  the  life  without  and 
the  life  within:  91-2  —  illustrations: 
Henry  the  Eighth  91-107 ;  Antony  and 
Cleopatra  132-5. 

Romance,  influence  of:  165-7. 

Romantic  drama  166-7,  185-6. 

Root  ideas  of  Shakespeare's  moral  sys- 
tem:   II  and  Book  I  —  heroism  and 


moral  balance  13  and  Chapter  I-^ 
wrong  and  retribution  33  and  Chapter 
II  —  innocence  and  pathos  46  and 
Chapter  III  — wrong  and  restoration 
65  and  Chapter  IV  — the  life  without 
and  the  life  within  89  and  Chapter  V 
—  all  harmonised  in  the  last  106-7. 

Roses,  wars  of:  41,  279,  292-4,  368-9. 

Rustic  atmosphere  in  Winter's  Tale: 
7^-3- 

Sackville  189. 

Satire  as  a  dramatic  tone  160,  176. 

Saucy  slave  (or  servant)  163,  339,  341, 

344. 
Scale:   of  tones  176-7  —  of  wrong  77, 

319.  351.  364. 

Serious  tone  176. 

Sharper  163. 

Siddons,  Mrs.,  on  responsibility  of  Mac- 
beth 247  note. 

Simplicity,  rustic,  in  Winter's  Tale: 
71-3. 

Situation :  comedies  of  339-42  [compare 
164]  —  tragedies  of  363. 

Sixfold  structure  65,  70-1,  76,  84. 

Spectacle,  the  drama  a :  8,  145, 176, 197, 
309-10,  316. 

Spectacular  relief  188-9,  370-3. 

Stage-directions  in  relation  to  questions 
of  the  Supernatural :  299-302, 260. 

State,  ancient  and  modem  conceptions 
of:  1 1 1-2. 

Stationary  action  332,  364. 

Story :  interest  of  162-76  —  harmony  of 
stories  168-9. 

Subaction  333,  336,  343,  345-6,  354, 
356-7,  370. 

Supernatural,  The,  as  one  of  the  forces 
of  life  in  Shakespeare's  moral  system : 
297  and  Chapter  XIV  —  dramatisa- 
tion of,  in  Midsummer-Night  and 
Tempest  297-8  —  reality  of,  in  other 
Shakespearean  dramas  298-302 — func- 
tion of,  in  Shakespearean  plot  302-10. 

Sway  of  Circumstances  268  [compare 
264-8]. 

Symmetry  as  an  element  of  dramatic 
interest  84,  329,  334-6,  337-8. 

System,  moral,  what  is  implied  in :  1-9. 


GENERAL  INDEX 


381 


Tetralogies  11,  33. 

Theatre  as  moral  laboratory  141  and 
Chapter  VII. 

Tone,  dramatic:  9,  197-8  —  analysis  of 
196-8  [compare  176-7]  —  mixture  of 
tones  197  [compare  162,  176]  —  tone- 
clash  197-8  —  tone-tremulousness  or 
humour  178  —  harmony  of  tones  as 
an  element  in  Shakespearean  comedy 
178-84 —  relief  tones  in  tragedy  188-94. 

Tragedy:  as  equilibrium  overthrown 
109,  184,  185  and  Chapter  IX  —  Greek 
conception  of  tragedy  186  [compare 
160]  — modification  under  romance 
influence  187  [compare  166]  —  speciali- 
sation to  the  idea  of  fallen  greatness 
187  —  use  of  relief  188-94 — ^^^  con- 
verse of  comedy  194. 

*  Problem  Tragedy  354— Tragedies 
of  Character  355-9,  364 — of  Nemesis 
356-9,  364  —  of  Pathos  358-60 — of 
Horror  361  —  Heroic  362  —  Love  362 

—  of  Situation  363  —  of  Intrigue  363 

—  of  Accident  364. 
Tragic  tone  176. 
Turning-points  265,  270-9. 

Underplot:  336  [compare  163]— illus- 
trations: Richard  the  Third  41; 
Twelfth  Nig  hi  171 ;  Lear  336;  various 


340-1,  343-4,  346-7,  350,  35^-3.355. 
358-9.  362,  364,  370-1,  372. 
Unstable  equilibrium  as  a  moral  problem 
in  Lear  141-3. 

Vice  as  an  institution  in  Measure  for 
Measure  143-5  —  as  a  spectacle  201-4. 
Villany,  ideal :  39-45. 

Weird  humour  as  relief  193. 

WiU,  personal,  as  one  of  the  forces  of 
life  in  Shakespeare's  moral  system : 
209  and  Chapter  XI  —  its  dramatic  ex- 
pression in  Intrigue  and  Irony  209  and 
Chapter  XI  —  restraints  on  209  —  he- 
redity 242-3  —  character  243-4 — envi- 
ronment 242,  264-8  [compare  297  and 
Chapter  XIV],  311,  326  and  Chapter 
XV. 

Wit  as  a  dramatic  tone  176. 

Witches  in  Macbeth :  298-310  passim. 

Wrong  and  Restoration,  as  one  of  the 
root  ideas  in  Shakespeare's  moral  sys- 
tem :  II,  65-88  —  illustrations :  Winter's 
Tale  65-76 ;   Cymbeline  76-88. 

Wrong  and  Retribution,  as  one  of  the 
root  ideas  in  Shakespeare's  moral  sys- 
tem :  II,  33  and  Chapter  II. 

Wrong,  graded :  ^^  [compare  351],  319- 
21  [compare  364]. 


THE  MODERN  READER'S  BIBLE 

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